Aviva Siegel, the wife of American hostage Kieth Siegel and a former hostage herself, is pleading with everyone and anyone involved in the hostage negotiations to get her husband, and the others, freed from Hamas captivity after they have spent more than 440 days in deplorable conditions.
“Hamas released a video of Keith, and I just saw the picture,” Aviva told Fox News Digital in an emotional interview in reference to a video Hamas released in April. “He looks terrible. His bones are out, and you can see that he’s lost a lot of weight.
“He doesn’t look like himself. And I’m just so worried about him, because so [many] days and minutes have passed since that video that we received,” she said. “I just don’t know what kind of Keith that we’re going to get back.”
“I’m worried about all the hostages, because the conditions that they are in are the worst conditions that any human being could go through,” Aviva said. “I was there. I touched death. I know what it feels being underneath the ground with no oxygen.
“Keith and I were just left there. We were left there to die,” she added.
Aviva and her husband of, at the time 42 years, were brutally abducted from their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, and held together for 51 days before she was released in the November 2023 hostage exchange after suffering from a stomach infection that left her incredibly ill.
She has since tirelessly fought for Kieth’s release, meeting with top officials in the US and Israel, traveling to the United States nine times in the last year and becoming a prominent advocate for the hostages.
“I just hope that he’s with other people from Israel, and if he has them, he’s going to be okay,” Aviva said. “He’s just the person that will make them feel that they’re together. That’s what he did when I was there – he was 100% for me and the hostages that we were with.”
“If you get kidnapped, get kidnapped with Keith, because he was outstanding to everybody. He was strong for all of us. And I’m sure that he’s keeping strong and keeping his hope to come out,” she said.
Aviva recounted their last moments together before they were separated ahead of her release, telling Fox News Digital, “When I left him, I told him to be the strongest – that he needs to be strong for me, and I’ll be strong for him.”
Top security officials from the US, Egypt, and Qatar have been pushing Israel and Hamas to agree to a cease-fire and the return of hostages.
Reports on Thursday suggested that negotiators are pushing for a 42-day cease-fire in which 34 of the at least 50 hostages still assessed to be alive, could be exchanged.
Hamas is also believed to continue to hold at least 38 who were taken hostage and then killed while in captivity, along with at least seven who are believed to have been killed on Oct. 7, 2023 and then taken into Gaza.
Though all the hostages are believed to have been held in deplorable conditions, the children, women – including the female IDF soldiers – the sick and the elderly have reportedly been front listed to be freed first in exchange for Hamas terrorists currently imprisoned.
“I’m keeping my hope and holding on and just waiting – waiting to hug Keith, and waiting for all the families, to get their families back,” Aviva said. “We need to get them back.”
Aviva said she dreams of the moment that she gets to hug her husband again and watch their grandchildren “jump into his arms.”
“We’ll be the happiest people on Earth,” she said. “All the hostages, I can’t imagine them coming home. It’ll be just the happiest moment for all of the families. We need it to happen.”
Reports in recent weeks suggest there is an increased sense of optimism in bringing home the hostages, but Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged some caution when speaking with MSNBC Morning Joe on Thursday when he said, “We are encouraged because this should happen, and it should happen because Hamas is at a point where the cavalry it thought might come to the rescue isn’t coming to the rescue, [Hezbollah’s] not coming to the rescue, [Iran’s] not coming to the rescue.”
“In the absence of that, I think the pressure is on Hamas to finally get to yes,” he added. “But look, I think we also have to be very realistic. We’ve had these Lucy and the football moments several times over the last months where we thought we were there, and the football gets pulled away.
“The real question is: Is Hamas capable of making a decision and getting to yes? We’ve been fanning out with every possible partner on this to try to get the necessary pressure exerted on Hamas to say yes,” Blinken added.