Daughter of Israeli still held in Gaza discusses mixed feelings after 1st hostage release

Read the Full Transcript

• Nick Schifrin:

  Twelve of the 13 Israeli hostages released from Gaza today were kidnapped from one kibbutz, Nir Oz. One out of four of Nir Oz's residents were kidnapped or killed; 79-year-old Chaim Peri was kidnapped from there. He remains a hostage.

  His daughter, Noam Peri, joins us now.

  Thank you very much, Noam. Welcome to the "NewsHour" again.

  How are you feeling today, your father remaining in captivity, but so many of these people from Nir Oz freed?

• Noam Peri:

  It's a day of mixed feelings, of course.

  I'm thrilled with everyone I see that — I know most of those people and been waiting to see them. I'm sure their families are waiting to have them just in those very moments that we talk. But, obviously, we still wait and worry very much about my father, who's currently not included in this deal, and many others as well.

• Nick Schifrin:

  Have you been able to talk with any of the families whose family members have been released today?

• Noam Peri:

  Not yet.

  We have been texting together, the families, this whole very tense day, and wishing them the best and wishing them to see their family members. So, we're waiting now for hours.

• Nick Schifrin:

  We can only imagine what you're all going through.

  About a month ago, we had you on the show. You were talking to my colleague Amna Nawaz, and you said that you had received a sign of life of your father from a hostage who had just been released, Yocheved Lifshitz. Have you received any new updates about your father's condition since then?

• Noam Peri:

  So, no. Since then, we had no signal and no sign of life.

  And it has been very, very long seven weeks now since my father was kidnapped from his home. And it's very hard to think him, how he survives these seven weeks, 50 days. I don't know, every hour, it's very hard to think about it.

• Nick Schifrin:

  Do you have faith? Do you have a sense, perhaps, that he's OK in there?

• Noam Peri:

  Definitely, I have faith. I know he — I hope and I know he is a strong man mentally. He's a brave man.

  But he's also not young anymore. He's almost 80. He's going to celebrate his 80s birthday in April. He suffers from heart disease and has undergone two surgeries. He's dependent on medications. Two days ago, some reporters have been taken down the tunnel underground under the Shifa Hospital in Gaza.

  And these reporters were, I think, probably most of them, men of 30 or 40 years old. And they have reported that, after an hour, one hour in those tunnels, they had — it was hard to breathe. And the conditions were terrible.

  I'm thinking how an 80-year-old man can survive there for seven weeks.

• Nick Schifrin:

  Over the next three to four days, about 50 women and children are scheduled to be released. There's a formula after that for one day of pause, another 10 women and children to be released.

  Do you have faith that, after that, this cease-fire will hold and your father will indeed be on the list?

• Noam Peri:

  I'm crossing my fingers every hour now that the cease-fire would hold and we will see every day people coming out of there, people that shouldn't have been there from the beginning, and definitely should not be there for even one more day.

  And, yes, I hope. I hope this will hold on and I hope we will see all children, women come out, and then obviously that I'm hoping that we will see my father and the other elderly like him going out of there. And we will not rest for a moment until this happens.

• Nick Schifrin:

  Some Israeli officials oppose this pause, because Hamas, of course, will use it to regroup, restrengthen perhaps. What do you say to that argument?

• Noam Peri:

  I say, I think this is one of our strengths as a society that we put lives in the first place. There is no other priority than to save lives.

  And some — I think that our enemies think it's a weakness, but it's not. It's a strength. It's a strength of the Israeli society. And I think the voices that talk against it are a minority.

• Nick Schifrin:

  Noam Peri joining us from Israel tonight, thank you very much.

• Noam Peri:

  Thank you.