Eli Sharabi spent 16 months in filthy tunnels under the Gaza Strip with his legs chained, surviving on mouldy pita. Two years after the Hamas attack that started the war in Gaza, he fears a fellow hostage he came to think of as an adopted son is enduring even worse.

Israel has battered its enemies across the region and laid waste to Gaza. But as it marks another grim war anniversary on Tuesday, it has yet to return the last 48 hostages taken in the attack, around 20 of them believed to be alive. A new US-backed peace plan has raised hopes of bringing them home.

Sharabi, 53, was freed in February. It was only then that he learned that his wife and two teenage daughters had been killed in their home by Hamas-led militants on October 7, 2023. There can be no closure for him, he said, until the return of all the hostages, including his closest companion in captivity, Alon Ohel, and the body of his older brother, Yossi.

Sharabi documented his experiences in Hostage, a book released in Hebrew earlier this year. The English translation of the first memoir by a former hostage comes out on October 7.

In the book, Sharabi describes how he was mostly held in dark tunnels crawling with insects and rats. He and three fellow hostages were only allowed to wash every few months, and at one point an angry guard beat him up, breaking several ribs.