Hostage Naama Levy is a peace activist
You know her — the one who was dragged by the hair from the back of a jeep to the back seat. Hear her talk at a Hands of Peace event.
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This is Ayala Levy Shahar, mother of 19-year-old Naama Levy, one of the hostages in the video released yesterday. She made this statement yesterday, after the release of the abduction video (below) in which we can see four of the young IDF spotters who tried desperately to get their commanders to heed their warnings that terrorists were preparing to break through the fence that very morning.
Released hostages who saw Naama in captivity told Levy Shahar that she was wounded in the leg on Oct 7th, but was walking on her own. I could find no other information at this time.
Levy Shahar, a physician who also works with the Israeli women’s national football team, wrote an opinion piece for The Guardian. You can read it here.
We remember Naama from the video that came out right away, in which they take her in her gray blood-streaked jogging pants from the back of a jeep and move her to the back seat. Here is a clip put together by Mideast Media Analyst Tom Gross in December 2023 showing, not just the hostage Naama Levy in the jeep scene, but the peace activist Naama Levy.
Naama’s father, Yoni Levy, has said that she also volunteered with women’s organizations, the Red Cross, and the UN — a lot for a 19-year-old. The latter two organizations did absolutely nothing for Naama even though they have an international mandate to ensure the health, welfare, and release of hostages, the taking of which is a war crime.
And here is the abduction video that was recorded by the body cameras of Hamas terrorists who took them and approved for release by the soldiers’ parents. It has been edited to put together recordings from a number of body cams and to edit out the more horrific scenes of dead bodies and the extreme brutality to which they were subjected. It is far more powerful than just hearing about their abduction.
So young, I can only hope they find the emotional resources to endure this and come home ready to recover from all they are going through and build good lives.
I believe in the resilience of the human spirit. But look at the horrific start to their now-230-day imprisonment in the dungeons of Gaza.
Seven spotter were abducted alive. Ori Megidish was rescued by IDF forces after 23 days in captivity; Noa Marciano was murdered while in captivity and her body was returned by the IDF for burial in Israel. Five — Liri Albag, Karina Ariev, Agam Berger, Daniela Gilboa, and Naama Levy — are still being held.
I am furious that their commanders told the spotters to stop harassing them on that morning as they had been doing for the days and even weeks leading up to Oct 7th. And if I am furious, I cannot even imagine the extent of the emotions felt by their parents, families, and friends. I hope their commanders are experiencing a guilt that is eating them up inside (and that they will face hefty suits and perhaps court martial after this war is over).
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Today, the Hostage Families Forum issued a press release in which they showed a clip of Naama’s older brother, Amit, showing the abduction video to British Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden at the British Cabinet Office. I hope they are imagining what they would do if one of these young women was a sister, daughter, neice, granddaughter of theirs.
The question is: what happens next? As Israel has refused to sign up to the International Criminal Court(unlike the Palestinian Authority ironically enough), it seems unlikely that the ICC(which has condemned mass rape in wartime- pace Ukraine- as a crime against humanity) will be able to prosecute and any Israeli prosecution of alleged Hamas rapists/killers will be tainted by the charges of bias we saw during the NI”Troubles” in both the Province and on the mainland UK!
Israel is not in the ICC because we have a functioning criminal court system of our own. And we are not seeking to prosecute Hamas crimes in the ICC, which we regard as a biased and illegitimate body, just like the UN, or anywhere else. We just want to win this war.
How is the ICC biased? The only previous accusations of bias have come from African countries- of which Israel is NOT one!
It would require me to write an entire article to answer that question, something I am not up to right now. But you might want to try searching using Google or some other search engine to read both sides of this issue — is the ICC biased against Israel.
Is the ICC biased against Russia because it indicted Putin? There’s an old legal joke- when you have a bad case to begin with, ALWAYS curse your judge!
This article is about a hostage who was a peace activist. Why are you responding here about the ICC? What has that got to do with the article about Naama Levy? When I write about the ICC, if I chose to do so, then you can ask me about that. Until then, expect no more responses to anything you write about the ICC.
I agree that I may have got off topic- but it’s hard to escape the implications of the pending possible arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Hamas leaders alike esp given that one of the charges against them is the mass rape and kidnapping of Israeli women and girls(inlcuding Ms Levy). BTW isn’t it a conflict of interest to be a peace activist AND an Israeli soldier???
It is not a conflict of interest to be a peace activist and an Israel soldier. Israel has mandatory draft, for one thing. For another thing, the purpose of the IDF is defensive and we only go on the offensive when it is to protect citizens. The IDF does not attack countries that do not attack us first.
The fact that the ICC sees an equivalence between Netanyahu and Sinwar is ridiculous and again, not relevant to this article.
Very tragic. While Naama demands and believes that she has Pali friends, the reality is that the palis she considers friends, behind her back laugh hysterically at her and can’t believe what a delusional, gullible useful idiot she is. Where are those pali friends now? The same place they were prior to Oct 7: nowhere!
I hope she is rescued, but what then? Will she become even more delusional or as a result of this experience will she finally acknowledge that just because you like someone doesn’t mean they like you back. Just because they pretend to be nice to you, they are not doing so out of friendship.
Many who believed in the possibility to bring peace by befriending Palestinian Arabs before Oct 7 no longer believe that. Some still do and I cannot understand how.