Former Israeli hostage Mia Schem recalls her hellish experience, dismisses idea of innocent civilians in Gaza
Hamas terrorists kidnapped 21-year-old French-Israeli woman Mia Schem at the Nova music festival on Oct. 7. Terrorists crossed over the Israel-Gaza border early that morning and massacred around 360 party attendees and at least 36 as hostages, including Schem.
Some 1,200 Israelis were killed that day, with a total of some 240 abducted from Israel's southern border communities into the Gaza Strip.
Schem spoke to Israeli media about her horrific 54 days in captivity in the Gaza Strip under very difficult living conditions and constant threats to her life.
While the Israel Defense Forces and Western nations insist on differentiating between Hamas terrorists and civilians in Gazan, Schem dismisses the idea of “innocent civilians” in Gaza from her experience.
“It’s important to me to reveal the real situation about the people who live in Gaza, who they really are, and what I went through there,” Schem said during an interview with Israel's Channel 13 news.
“I experienced hell. Everyone there are terrorists… there are no innocent civilians, not one,” she said. “[Innocent civilians] don’t exist,” she added.
Former hostage Mia Schem: "I went through a Holocaust" pic.twitter.com/FsTGSd6OX7
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Schem recalled the horror at the music festival when white pickup trucks with terrorists arrived. She described how “one of the Hamas members looked at me, and just shot me in the arm, at a very, very close range.”
She initially believed she had lost her hand. “I was on the floor, covered in blood, and I screamed, ‘I lost my hand, I lost my hand.'”
Schem recalled that a Hamas terrorist initially tried to sexually assault her at the music festival site but stopped touching her when she started screaming due to the pain caused by the injury in her arm.
“And then out of nowhere somebody grabbed me by my hair, pulled me into a car and drove me to Gaza,” Schem explained.
There in Gaza, she had surgery under primitive conditions “without anesthesia, nothing.” Schem recalls that the Gazan who operated her told her: ‘You’re not going home alive.'”
During the interview, the 21-year-old stressed that she felt like “an animal at the zoo” during her entire captivity in the Gaza Strip.
Schem revealed that she was being held captive by an entire family, including a mother and her young children who terrorized her. “I began asking myself questions: 'Why am I in a family home? Why are there children here? Why is there a woman here?”
Schem said it is not possible to distinguish between Hamas and Gazan civilians.
“There are no innocent citizens there. Their families are controlled by Hamas. Their children who, from the moment they are born, they teach them that Israel is Palestine and just to hate Jews,” she stated, adding that the Gazan woman was evil and treated her very badly.
In mid-October, Hamas chose Schem to be the first hostage filmed in their propaganda videos released to the outside world. In the video, a pale-looking Schem was forced to say that she was being treated well by Hamas.
“They told me to say that they were taking care of me and treating me… You do what you’re told. You’re afraid to die,” Schem recalled during her interview.
Since her return to Israel, Schem has undergone advanced surgery and rehabilitation for her injured arm.
The All Israel News Staff is a team of journalists in Israel.
