'I went through a holocaust' as a Hamas captive
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A 21-year-old Israeli-French tattoo artist who was abducted by Hamas has recalled the horrors that she faced in Gaza in her first interview, saying she “went through a holocaust” during her 54 days in captivity.
Mia Schem was asked in a preview clip of an interview with Channel 13 why she decided to open up about her experience at the hands of the terrorists.
“It was important to me to relay the truth about the nature of the people who live in Gaza, who they are truly are and what I experienced there,” the young woman tells journalist Lior Veroslavski in the clip released Thursday.
Veroslavski replies, “It was important to you that the world understands what?”
“That I went through a holocaust,” the former hostage says, matter-of-factly. “Everyone over there is a terrorist.”
Schem adds that after being kidnapped from a musical festival in southern Israel on Oct. 7, she was held by a civilian family in Gaza that was involved with the terror group.
“Suddenly I realized that I’m with a family,” she says. “Suddenly I’m asking myself questions: Why am I in some family’s home? Why are there kids here? Why is there a wife?”
Schem, a resident of Shoham in central Israel, was recently released as part of a temporary cease-fire between Hamas and the Jewish state.
She appeared on Instagram sporting a defiant new tattoo that reads, “We will dance again.” Her new ink includes the date of the attack.
“I will never forget October 7, 2023,” she wrote in the post.
“The pain and the fear, the difficult sights, the friends who won’t come back, and those we must bring back. But we will win, we will dance!” Schem added.
Shortly after the start of the war, Schem was seen in a chilling video released by Hamas showing her getting treated by a veterinarian for a wound on her right arm.
“At the moment, I am in Gaza,” she said in Hebrew in the clip, adding that she was taken across the border, where she underwent a three-hour surgery for her undisclosed injuries.
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