Omer Shem Tov Reveals Hamas Tried to Use Him in Plot to Kill IDF Soldiers

Released hostage Omer Shem Tov spoke Thursday about his 505 days in Hamas captivity and the moment he realized they had intended to use him in a deadly ambush against Israeli soldiers. Omer, who was freed in a recent prisoner exchange, shared chilling details of his ordeal with Channel 12.

Omer says his captors once threw what he estimated to be three million shekels across the floor and ordered him to demolish a building situated above the tunnel in which he was imprisoned. When he refused to take part, he said the terrorists threatened to execute him on the spot.

“Shoot me in the head, then,” Shem Tov told them in defiance.

He described being held underground, where he endured starvation and was only provided with “salty water” to drink.

Omer was kidnapped from the Nova festival on Oct. 7; he was one of the attendees who Ori Danino Hy”d attempted to save.

Ori, one of six hostages later found murdered in a tunnel in Rafah, had initially escaped the massacre but was captured while trying to rescue others. Omer recounted how Ori urged them to stay down: “Ori really, really took care of us.”

Despite Danino’s bravery, their car was intercepted. Shem Tov said that the terrorists threw Danino to the ground, tied his hands, and then turned their violence on him, beating him and placing him beneath the car’s front wheels.

“All I could think was that he’s going to run me over,” Shem Tov said, adding that he thought about Gilad Shalit, the IDF soldier held in Gaza for five years.

Once in Gaza, Shem Tov said he quickly tried to humanize himself to his captors by asking them for their names and singing for them.

He was held alongside another hostage, Itay Regev, for 50 days while being moved between apartments. At one point, he recalled the sound of nearby IDF airstrikes causing the buildings around them to shake.

When Itay was released, Omer said he began to spiral. “Suddenly, there was silence in the apartment, and then the pressures began, the concerns began, the feeling of loneliness. I just felt like I’m going crazy,” he shared.

He was then moved to a narrow, dark tunnel where he spent 50 days with minimal food,just one biscuit per day, and no light. “The water during this period,” he said, “was salty.”

“I was very, very thin. I could already see the bones,” he explained. Eventually, he was relocated to a larger tunnel, where he remained for over 400 days. His captors eventually stopped interrogating him as they became more focused on the presence of nearby IDF soldiers.

Although he was spared further questioning, Omer said the soldiers’ proximity worsened his treatment. The captors became increasingly abusive, often spitting on him and shouting insults.

At one point, believing the IDF was close enough to hear or rescue him, Omer considered escaping. “I said okay. The IDF is above me right now, I have a chance to escape. It was at night, everyone was asleep,” he recalled. “I got to my feet, my heart was pounding.” But before he could move further, a guard pointed a pistol at him, then slowly put it away.

“I believe it was fear. To be a deterrent,” he said of the incident.

Over time, he occasionally caught brief news segments on Al Jazeera, including one that informed him he would be among 33 hostages freed in a ceasefire deal.

Once the ceasefire was enacted, Hamas began giving him more food. After 450 days underground, Omer finally emerged to breathe fresh air, which he described simply as “heaven.”

Though now free, Omer expressed deep guilt over the hostages still left behind.

“You tell yourself: Why am I here and they are not? What about them? I don’t understand why I am here and they are not. In what way am I worth more? We are the same. There should not be a list. It should be everyone and that’s it.”