Emily Damari Shares Unseen Photos From Hamas Captivity

Emily Damari, who was kidnapped on October 7, 2023, and survived Hamas captivity, posted previously unreleased photos from her time as a hostage on Instagram on Saturday, The Jerusalem Post reported. She shared them to mark three years since her abduction on the Hebrew calendar, on Simchat Torah, the holiday that falls on the Hebrew date of the attack. "Three years ago at this time on Simchat Torah I was deep, deep in the Gaza Strip," Damari wrote.

The pictures show Damari at Shifa Hospital in Gaza shortly after her abduction, where she was treated for a gunshot wound in her hand and a shrapnel injury in her leg, according to The Jerusalem Post. Two of her fingers were amputated. Agencia AJN reported the images were recovered during IDF operations in Gaza and show her lying on an operating table beside hospital medical staff.

Damari described a filthy room full of blood with a corpse on the floor beside her, The Jerusalem Post reported. She wrote that a man approached and introduced himself as "Dr. Hamas," with ten more armed men pointing Kalashnikovs at her head. "People who know a little bit about medicine can understand from the pictures that the fact that I'm here today is a miracle," she added. She wrote that her leg kept bleeding for four months, and that stitches in her hand meant to come out after two weeks stayed in for a full year.

Damari has said before that her leg wound was improperly stitched, which is why it kept bleeding, The Jerusalem Post reported. In March 2025, after corrective surgery on her hand, she said "Dr. Hamas" told her when she woke up that she had lost two fingers, and that her leg wound was left open with only four stitches instead of sixteen. Agencia AJN reported that Damari was taken from her home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, near the Gaza border, and was shot during the kidnapping.

Damari was released in January 2025 after 471 days in captivity, Agencia AJN reported. In August she married her partner, Israeli food influencer Danielle "Dani" Amit, in Tel Aviv, according to The Jerusalem Post. The couple got engaged in January 2026, a year after her release. "For 471 days, she was held in captivity," her mother, Mandy, said at the celebration. Other former hostages joined the wedding, among them Romi Gonen, Doron Steinbrecher, Liri Albag, Danielle Gilboa, Omer Shem Tov, Keith and Aviva Siegal, and Gali and Ziv Berman, The Jerusalem Post reported.