Can you imagine what goes through your head after being captured? Will they torture you and let you suffer? How will you pass the time and have fate you will make it alive? Are you psychologically prepared to survive this and if so what would be the aftermath? How can you see the light at the end of the tunnel?
On October 15 there was a one hour interview with Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier who was abducted by Hamas militants in a cross-border raid via underground tunnels near the Israeli border with Gaza on in June of 2006. The interview nearly marked the one year anniversary of his return home from a more than five year capture.
The interview first showed the support of all of Israel throughout the five years of his captivity, showing city marches, bumper stickers, fundraisers, and protests on the tv screen, all to get the then 20-year old young man back to his country.
Gilad's mom mentioned in an interview taped during his captivity that everything she is surrounded with, she wonders if he has, wherever he may be: It's cold here, does he have a sweater? With every bite she wondered if he had any food. To pass the time he would "play all sorts of games, mostly sports-related. I would form a ball out of a sock or a shirt and throw all kinds of things to the trash bin. I also wrote." He regularly drew his neighborhood to not forget it, and followed a daily routine. He went to sleep around the same time every day, based on the sunset.
Almost every Israeli citizen was backing him until the last hour that his release became reality.
Referring to the day of his release he said the following: "I was nervous. There was a lot of pressure. I didn’t know if anything would happen at the last minute, if anyone would try and hit us, if something would go wrong.
Once I got out of the car and was handed over to the Egyptians, then there was a sense of relief. All of a sudden I saw all these people around, hundreds. After not seeing more than a handful of people for all those years."
He wasn't home free just yet. The first interview after his release was conducted in Egypt by an Egyptian woman. Watching the clip, the viewer could see him nervously swiveling in a black chair. When Gilad was exposed to anybody during his captivity it was strictly Arab men. Gilad didn't know how to act in front of women.
The first thing skinny Gilad did when he set foot in Israel was salute the Prime Minister Natanyahu. Not only was he about to see his parents in a few hundreds meters but it was the first time he was exposed to sun and the outside air in over five years.
The first thing he wanted to do after this release was to play basketball with friends and ride his bike around the neighborhood. Although he has been waiting for this day for multiple years, he comments the following: "It's difficult coming back to normal life. It's difficult socially. People have changed, have grown up, you feel as if you were left behind."
The whole ambiance of the interview was calm and insightful, while at the same time keeping its' distance. The questions toward Gilad were positive and happy ones, such as "What did you look forward to?" His mother was asked "What did Gilad smell like to you?" This is a very respectable manner to interview someone who has just gone through a harsh situation like his. In America, they would first of all, not be able to give him his space and only be able to wait two days at most, to interview him. The questions would be more invasive and show the suffering much more. This is American culture.
When the hour was over i felt happy that Israel got their son back and he had returned back to normal life!
This specific interview touched my heart since I was in Israel for the release of his captivity and witnessed the energy and unity of the country. It's something very special that I have never witnessed in any other country.
