Former Hamas hostages Emily Damari and Romi Gonen appeared on the music branch of Army Radio, Galgalatz, on Monday, where they discussed their experiences during their captivity, including when they first learned about Hamas arch-terrorist Yahya Sinwar's death.
"We saw Sinwar on TV, in the famous picture of his, with his nice teeth," Damari recalled.
"I asked the terrorist, 'What's written on TV?'" Gonen added. "He said, 'Your army killed 20 children.' I told him, 'But there's a picture of Sinwar.'"
"'No, no, it's not Sinwar!' he told us," Damari continued.
"And then he told us, 'Your lying military says it killed Sinwar,' and we thought, 'Oh, cool!'" Gonen expanded.
"Eventually, they admitted Sinwar was dead, and said 'May Allah have mercy on him,' and when we were left alone, Romi and I would say 'they really killed him,'" Damari recounted.
'You Have Me': Singing their song in Arabic during captivity
Since their release from captivity, both Damari and Gonen have repeatedly talked about how they became inseparable and relied on each other to make it through what the terrorists were doing to them.
During the interview, Damari explained how they sang "You Have Me" by Moshe Peretz to each other, learning some of it in Arabic.
"We had to whisper it," Damari continued, noting that they sang because "there is not much else to do during captivity. That's the truth!"
The host asked if they would have been allowed to sing louder if they sang in Arabic rather than Hebrew. "No, because we are women," Damari explained.
Damari: Could not stop listening to October 7 massacre victims names
Damari recalled listening to the names of the victims of the October 7 massacre during an overnight broadcast between October 6-7, 2024.
"We were in some kind of transition between residences. The military was close to Jabalya - we were close to Jabalya, they were moving us, and everything was happening at once."
"I was sitting by the radio and could not stop listening to the broadcast of the names [of the victims]," Damari explained.
"I sat with a paper and pen and managed to record the names of 44 victims from Kibbutz Kfar Aza," she continued.
Damari explained how they had to swap places, but continued adding to the list from where the previous person left off.
"We took time to understand how many were killed where - how many at the Nova music festival, how many at Kfar Aza," Gonen elaborated.
'What happened to my home, to our friends?'
"I asked to look at publications so I could see what happened to my home," Damari recalled.
Gonen "wanted to find out what happened to her friends at the party, but I wanted to find out what happened to my home," she added.
"I could not believe what they did to my home, and I said to Romi, 'I could leave the Gaza Strip now, and in 25 minutes I would be in my home. Do you understand that?'" she concluded.
Damari, Gonen had suicide pact during captivity
In July, Damari, who also holds British citizenship, told The Daily Mail that she was so mistreated by Hamas terror captors that she considered suicide.
“They were the worst people – the worst family,” she said. “They would make fun of us and laugh at us. They would tell us: ‘Nobody cares about you.’ They would hide food from us and tell us we were never leaving Gaza.”
She explained that she had made a suicide pact with Gonen, with whom she was held. The pair had decided to either escape or end their lives to put a stop to the cruelty.
Gonen was interviewed by Channel 12's "Uvda" about her experiences in Gaza captivity, in a two-part broadcast on December 25 and January 1.
During the "Uvda" broadcast, she recounted how terrorists repeatedly sexually abused her and described her recovery process since her release.
The two were released from captivity on January 19, 2025, along with fellow hostage Doron Steinbrecher, after being held by terrorists in the Gaza Strip for 471 days.
Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.