Jerusalem: The war in Gaza has been going on since October 2023. Thousands of civilians, caught in the crossfire between Israeli and Hamas strikes, have lost their lives. In recent weeks, many, including hundreds of children, have been dying because of starvation.
Amid reports of the Israeli military killing at least 45 people who were desperately seeking aid in Gaza, a video shared by Palestinian group Hamas shows an Israeli hostage digging what he describes as his own grave inside a narrow underground tunnel.
Evyatar David, 24, looks extremely thin in the video footage, and his voice is barely audible.
He is seen holding a shovel, digging feebly and struggling to speak as he describes his inhuman condition. “What I’m doing now is digging my own grave. Every day my body becomes weaker and weaker. I’m walking directly to my grave. There is the grave where I am going to be buried in. Time is running out to be released and be able to sleep in my bed with my family,” David says, speaking in Hebrew.
He is seen collapsing to the floor and breaking down at the end of the video.
How psychopathic is Hamas?
It forced starving hostage Evyatar David to DIG HIS OWN GRAVE for the cameras. pic.twitter.com/iMa404St4s
— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) August 2, 2025
This is the second video of David released by the Palestine militant group in two days.
“The deliberate starvation of our son as part of a propaganda campaign is one of the most horrifying acts the world has seen. He is being starved purely to serve Hamas’ propaganda,” David’s family said.
David is one of 49 Israeli hostages still being held by Hamas and other Palestinian factions in Gaza. He was captured during the sudden and deadly attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023, in which over 1,200 people were killed, most of them civilians.
Netanyahu’s promise
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with David’s family after the video was released, and said he was deeply shocked by what he saw.
Netanyahu promised that efforts to bring back the hostages are continuing “constantly and relentlessly.” He accused Hamas of “deliberately starving our hostages” and spreading the footage “in a cynical and evil manner.”
Hamas and another group, Islamic Jihad, released another video of hostage Rom Braslavski, a 21-year-old German-Israeli dual citizen. Like David, he also appears thin and pale.