A year ago, Ebiatal David appeared in a Hamas propaganda video, emaciated and skeletal, holding a shovel inside a concrete tunnel and digging what he said was his grave.
This month, the former Israeli hostage smiled as he stood playing guitar with his sister and exchanged vows at his brother Eli’s wedding.
“They tried to ruin (our lives) and the lives of our families, but in the end they couldn’t ruin everything,” David said. He pointed to the wedding of another hostage, Elijah Cohen, as the ultimate form of victory over his captors. “This is the biggest showdown and the moment of great victory,” he said.
The 25-year-old told CNN in his first international media interview since his release nearly a year ago, but there remains no peace in sight. He spoke about the starvation he endured in captivity, how music helped him through the difficult months after his release, and his determination to never let the world forget what he and his fellow hostages went through.
David was 22 years old when he and his childhood friend Guy Gilboa Dalal were abducted from the Nova Music Festival during the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. Two other friends in their group were killed in the attack. David and Gilboa-Dalal were taken to Gaza, where they spent most of their time together underground.
David was one of the last 20 living Israeli hostages in the Gaza Strip, released on October 13, 2025, after 738 days in captivity as part of a US-brokered ceasefire agreement.
In the months following his return, David largely avoided public appearances and focused on his rehabilitation. Last month, ahead of his first interview with Israeli television, he revealed on social media that he suffers from PTSD and other psychological effects.
“It can surprise me at any time. One hour I can be fine and happy and the next I have flashbacks, remembering when I was in captivity. I wake up with nightmares at night and it affects me all day after that. It’s very erratic and random,” he told CNN.
David described what he called “extreme hunger” during his captivity, which worsened in the months before the August 2025 video was shot.
“Beyond the physical feeling of not having enough food or being hungry all the time, hunger is the mental feeling of not having anything to eat, not knowing if there will be food in an hour, tomorrow, two days, not knowing what’s going to happen, maybe starving to death,” he says. Severe starvation also caused stress and conflict among the hostages, he added.
David said he was chosen to appear in the video because his captors compared his physical condition to that of Gilboa Dalal. Because he looked bad, “they decided I’d be the actor in the video,” he said.
“It’s all staged, but it’s based on truth. We hadn’t eaten for three months,” he said. “Everything I said or did there, they told me to do it. You can see by my body that when I tried to dig the grave, I could barely move, except hold the shovel. It was probably the hardest physical thing I’ve ever done.” When he told his captors about his near collapse, he said, they ignored him. “I could hear them eating cake and drinking tea and laughing, as if there wasn’t someone walking next to them who looked like a skeleton,” he told CNN.
He said the guards had access to food, air conditioning and television. “They told us there was no food in Gaza, but we knew that wasn’t true, because we saw terrorists all the time. They were fat and muscular. We knew they were lying and starving us.”
This was not the first time Hamas had photographed him for propaganda purposes. In February 2025, he and Gilboa Dalal were taken to a staged release ceremony for two other hostages, where they were filmed pleading for freedom. The video was released by Hamas and was described by the hostages’ families as psychologically terrifying.
What sustained him underground, he said, was the thought that his family was waiting outside and the idea that “no matter how bad things are, things can always get worse, so you can always find something good.”
“When you feel like you’re at rock bottom, that’s the best time not to give up, because it can break you. If you understand that and don’t break yourself, you’ll find yourself in a better place. It doesn’t matter what you’ve been through. Don’t give up when you feel like you’re about to break, because this could be your turning point.”
David said his recovery was “very complicated”. He described himself as a “normal person” before being taken hostage. “It’s completely different now. I still need some time to process all of this. I’m doing a good rehab and trying to figure out how to help myself through this,” he said.
His family and friends have launched a crowdfunding campaign for rehabilitation, saying the state is not providing enough help to the former hostages. “I hope the next government does better. I don’t know who it will be, but I believe they will do better.”
David says music plays an important role in his recovery process. During his captivity, his brothers organized weekly jam sessions in his honor in Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square. It became one of his main coping tools. “When I feel sad or upset, it’s one of the best things I can do to escape from my thoughts and stay calm and not stress. I don’t know what I would do without music.”
Talking about his time in captivity is also helpful, he said, and he and his brother plan to travel to the United States next month for a series of public appearances.
“It’s very important to us to keep our story alive and that people understand and remember what we went through,” he said. “The world needs to know what happened and we can’t forget it.”
Correction: This article has been updated to clarify that Evyatar David is 25 years old.
