(NewsNation) — In her first TV interview since being abducted by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, Chicago-area mom Judith Raanan said her captors were greeted as heroes when she and her daughter were taken as hostages at a Gaza hospital.
Israeli Gaza expert Shlomi Eldar joined “Elizabeth Vargas Reports” to discuss Raanan’s account of her captivity, saying, “It’s very disturbing to know now that Hamas used hospitals as bases.”
U.S. spy agencies have long assessed that Hamas used Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital to command forces and hold some hostages.
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have also been criticized for targeting hospitals, stoking alarm over the fate of civilians and patients who were inside.
“We’ve known it for many, many years,” Eldar said. “But now, to hear these voices, this testimony, I think it’s very clear.”
“And when we’ve been asked all the time why Israel is acting in Gaza like that,” he continued. “We have to understand that Hamas, during the years, used the people in Gaza as human shields. And this is the consequences of what Hamas is doing for many, many years.”
At the hospital, Raanan said the nurses were cheering the arrival of the hostages and that she interacted with a man she believed to be a “very high-ranked” Hamas leader who spoke “brilliant Hebrew.”
“Most of the the doctors and the nurses in the Hamas hospitals in the Gaza Strip were appointed by Hamas,” Eldar said. “So they are a member of the Hamas movement. It’s very, very clear. So that’s why they are cheering.”
Eldar said that many of the Palestinians in Gaza experienced “brainwashing” from Yahya Sinwar, leader of Hamas’ political wing in Gaza.
“It’s part of his war against Israel,” Eldar explained, saying Sinwar needed to control the people of Gaza in preparation for the Oct. 7 attack.
Raanan also relayed a story about how the terrorists forced her at gunpoint to try and coerce an Israeli family to leave the safe room they were sheltering in during the attack.
“They came, they were prepared, and they butchered many, many people,” Eldar said, stressing that hearing the stories of freed hostages is “very important to us and to the world.”
Having covered the Hamas movement since the 1990s, Eldar said, “This is not Hamas that I’ve known.”
“This is something else,” he said. “This is a totally different movement.”
Eldar said Hamas leadership could not have understood the consequences of such an attack.
“The residents of Gaza will pay what the price is of this attack,” he said. “And we can see now what happened in the Gaza Strip. And it’s very sad.”
Watch the interview with Israeli Gaza expert Shlomi Eldar in the video player at the top of the page.