Rina Angrest, the grandmother of Matan Angrest—an IDF soldier abducted from a tank on Oct. 7—expressed frustration Wednesday at the abbreviated duration of the Cabinet's latest meeting, which reportedly failed to consider Israel’s proposed response to a possible deal for her grandson’s release.
Speaking in an interview on Ynet studio, she said, “They can’t offer a deal? Hamas agreed, and they are playing with people’s lives. Look what they are preoccupied with.”
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Matan Angrest in Hamas captivity
(Photo: Courtesy of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum)
Angrest added, “We’re already at day 691. We’re suffering; we cannot breathe. I’m not speaking just for us, I’m talking about all the families and all the hostages who are under the ground. They are deep, deep in the tunnels. They cannot breathe, they cannot eat, they’re being tortured. Almost a month ago, we saw the condition of Evyatar [David] and Rom [Braslavski]. This is unacceptable. Yesterday, we went to the Defense Ministry headquarters, to the gate, hoping to give the Cabinet suggestions about what it could still do. The police blocked us; they put cuffs on the railings. They’re dealing with their own matters—what about the hostages?”
She continued, “A month ago, when they wanted to pass a draft law, they stayed until dawn to settle those matters. Why isn’t the issue of the hostages important to them? Every minute is important to my grandson who is there, every minute is important to everyone. We are in a dreadful situation and all they should be doing is focusing on it. The hostages cannot go on like this.”
Angrest described Matan’s condition based on reports from survivors of captivity and the final video of him. “In the video, you see irreversible damage, his condition is irreversible. He has cracks in the eye socket and nose, and his hand is fixed in place. He spoke so weakly, barely spoke. I understand he barely receives food. Anat [Matan’s mother] spoke with a released captive. They electrocuted Matan with a car battery. That is his condition. After that, they brought him up several times to breathe and then returned him to the tunnel. They have no food, no water; they are tortured all the time. These are not things we came up with,” she said.
“Every family wants their child home—either for burial or rehabilitation. Why must we go through 691 days with nothing moving? They don’t do what they have to do—both the Cabinet and the government must sit and not let go of this issue. We are not living. We are sad and weep. We cannot accept this. Every day we say, ‘Maybe today we’ll hear some good news, maybe.’ There are people there with souls—they want to come home. They need rehabilitation. How can the government not understand this?”
On the other hand, Zvika Mor, chairman of the Tikvah Forum hostage family lobby, expressed a different perspective, while reiterating the hope that his abducted son, Eitan Mor, remains alive. “The event yesterday that they went to was a salute to the residents of Binyamin,” he said. “This is likely the regional council with the highest number of reservists serving and falling in the war—and it also includes two hostages. The government has been handling many matters over the past two years, and what needs to be dealt with in the context of the war and the hostages is being addressed. Although I’m not satisfied with what is happening, the big problem is that we are losing our brotherhood.”
Mor rejected criticism from other families amid reports that the Cabinet did not discuss the hostages during its meeting, and the widespread protests across the country. “How do I know what was discussed there? I don’t know. It needs to be checked. Yesterday was another day of roadblocks. Civilians feel permitted to break the law and block roads, preventing thousands of drivers with children or people going to medical treatments in August from passing. Why don’t we begin treating each other as brothers? They are punishing civilians because there is pain? Turn your pain toward the government, lay siege to ministers’ houses—why punish us? These are left-wing protests, factually. There’s no point arguing.”