Freed Hamas hostage Emily Hand, 11, finally able to sleep alone at night three years after horror

Freed Hamas child hostage Emily Hand is bravely finally coming to terms with her horrific ordeal on the third anniversary of the October 7th attacks. She was just eight when she was snatched by Hamas gunmen, and had her ninth birthday while being held for 49 days. Now in an exclusive interview with the Mirror , her dad, Irishman Thomas Hand, said his daughter, now 11, was growing stronger every day. He revealed that his daughter had only "in the last month or so" stopped needing to climb into his bed at night to feel secure from her fear of attack or kidnapping.

He said: "She's stopped pulling her mattress right up to mine in the middle of the night, and is now almost entirely independent - much to my relief. And she's also just recently stopped calling me on her mobile phone to come and fetch her from a friend’s house after dark on our temporary kibbutz." To see more of the stories you love from The Mirror and to find them easily in Google then make us your preferred source. Free and easy-to-do, just click on the link here to find more from The Mirror at the top of your feed.

Emily and her dad, like many of those who were attacked on Kibbutz Be'eri, on the border with Gaza, have been given prefab houses on a kibbutz that is further from the border and was not attacked on October 7. Thomas said: “We're really looking forward immensely to moving back to our first kibbutz, Be'eri, which until the attack was seen by me and by Emily as paradise. "I'm still a bit nervous though - literally and figuratively - about trying to build our lives up again there.

Many houses and buildings on our kibbutz remain wrecked, including the kindergarten and playground. And it's so close to Gaza, from where we were attacked." He and Emily are due to go back to Be'eri "for a very emotional reunion of all our kibbutz members and friends" on October 7. It’s the third anniversary of the attack that left 102 people from his kibbutz dead and led to 34 others being taken hostage. All but four of the kibbutz's hostages eventually returned alive.

Horse-riding has been Emily's main outdoor pursuit - and also, according to her psychologists, a means of making her feel she is in control rather than a buffeted victim. "With her love for animals -- though she's no longer obsessed with snails -- she hopes one day to become a vet," said Thomas. Emily's beloved pet dog Johnsey still sleeps cuddled up to her every night. The dog came with Thomas in an Israeli military vehicle as Emily was about to be brought back across the Gaza border into Israel .

For their reunion, Thomas knew Emily loved her pet so much she would hug the animal first, "and I could then get the second hug". He said: "I thought in her child's mind she would feel like I had betrayed her - by not coming to save her from the gunmen." However, in fact Emily rushed straight into her father's arms, with Johnsey yapping at her heels; a moment Thomas still looks back on with delight and amazement. Recently Thomas and Emily got a surprise visit from one of the most famous hostages, Noa Argamani, who had been held with Emily for most of her 49 days in captivity, alongside her friend Hilla, who kidnapped when she was 12.

Thomas said: “Noa just turned up unannounced, and she and the two girls sat outside on our porch and chatted and laughed. These sort of meetings with ex-hostages take place occasionally, and though they stir up hard memories, they're in some way therapeutic." Argamani had been filmed terrified on the back of a kidnapper's motorbike, then, after Emily and Hilla's return, had disappeared for over year until being rescued in a raid by Israeli troops.

Thomas added: “Back on our destroyed kibbutz tomorrow, I'll be thinking of all of those 102 dead people. I knew all of them so well. The freedom-loving Western world should help us make sure we are never subjected to these vicious terrorist onslaughts again.” More than 1,200 people were killed when Hamas gunmen stormed through the border fence on October 7th 2023. 36 of them were children. A total of 251 people were taken hostage. All living hostages were freed by the end of 2025.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health said the death toll of Gazans stood at more than 74,000 with 172,000 injured. Israel launched air strikes immediately after October 7th, and a full scale ground invasion on October 27th 2023.