Trump envoy meets with Israeli hostage families
Newshour
BBC
4.4 • 984 Ratings
🗓️ 2 August 2025
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Hamas releases a shocking video of an emaciated Israeli hostage as the US special envoy says they are determined to push for a deal to end this war rather than reach a temporary ceasefire.
We speak to one of the Israeli hostage families who met US President Donald Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff in Tel Aviv.
Also on the programme: a court in southern India has sentenced a prominent politician to life in prison for raping one of his domestic staff; and would you use an app allowing guests to buy a seat at your wedding for €150?
(Photo: Steve Witkoff meets with Israeli hostage family members on August 2, 2025. Credit: The Hostages and Missing Families Forum Headquarters)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to NewsHour from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:06.9 | We're coming to you live from our studio in London. |
| 0:09.8 | I'm Lee Stuterte Dusset. |
| 0:11.7 | Today, another horrific image of starvation in Gaza. |
| 0:15.3 | This time, not a Palestinian, but an Israeli hostage. |
| 0:18.9 | A shocking video of Eviatar David has been released by Hamas, |
| 0:23.6 | shirtless just skin and bones, his voice weak. He says he hasn't eaten for days. |
| 0:28.8 | And he's seen digging inside a dimly lit tunnel, saying he fears it will be his grave. |
| 0:35.4 | His distraught family gave permission for the entire video to be released, |
| 0:39.6 | accusing Hamas of deliberately starving him |
| 0:42.0 | in a vile propaganda campaign. |
| 0:44.8 | Today, in Tel Aviv, |
| 0:46.5 | families of hostages gathered again |
| 0:48.5 | in what's known as Hostages Square |
| 0:50.5 | to meet the U.S. Special Envoy, |
| 0:52.8 | Steve Whitkoff, urging him to do more. |
| 0:57.0 | Bring them home now. Bring them home now, they shout. Mr. Whitkoff reassured him it was his sacred |
| 1:09.7 | mission. Yesterday, he visited Gaza in the midst of growing outrage around the world, |
| 1:14.8 | has evident in its amounts of growing starvation among Palestinians there, |
| 1:18.9 | even though Israel continues to deny there is starvation and accuses Hamas of diverting aid. |
| 1:25.4 | In a moment, we'll speak with Tal Schneider, political and diplomatic correspondent at the times of Israel. |
| 1:31.0 | But first, just before we came on air, I spoke with Ruby Chen, father of Itai, a 19-year-old dual American Israeli citizen, believed to have been killed by Hamas as he served on a tank battalion on the Gaza border |
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