Mother of British woman still held by Hamas says it’s ‘breaking my heart’

A devastated mother of a kidnapped British woman has revealed what the past year has been like since Hamas captured her daughter.

Mandy Damari, 63, said her life turned into a ‘nightmare’ after her daughter Emily was taken captive from a Kibbutz in Israel almost a year ago.

The militant group has held Emily Damari for 364 days following her kidnapping.

The 28-year-old Tottenham Hotspur fan was taken from her home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza near the Gaza border.

She was reportedly shot in the hand while her golden cockapoo Choocha was killed.

Emily was taken away in her car and she is thought to be currently held in a Hamas tunnel.

‘We cannot let another day pass’

Mandy, a nursery school teacher from Surrey, has spent every waking moment over the past year to lobby for Emily’s release and meeting with officials.

Speaking at an anniversary event commemorating the October 7 attack held at London’s Hyde Park, she told the crowd: ‘It is breaking my heart a little more, day by day.

‘Soon there will be nothing left of my heart – or Emily.’

She travelled to Downing Street on Monday to demand that the UK government takes action to free the last British hostage still held by Hamas.

Mandy handed a note to Prime Minister Keir Starmer addressed to Emily and pleaded with him to do everything in his power to get the letter to her.

She said today: ‘Diplomatic pressure, negotiations, humanitarian efforts—whatever it takes.

‘We cannot let another day pass.

‘We cannot afford to lose any more lives to this nightmare. We don’t need tea and sympathy, we need actions not words.’

In the heartbreaking letter, Mandy told Emily to ‘please keep strong, keep praying and just be your beautiful self that I love to the moon and back.

‘You will come home. And I promise that I’ll never complain again about your perfume sticking to me when you’re home,’ she wrote.

It comes almost a year after the violence escalated between Hamas and Israel following the armed group’s attack and taking of hostages to Gaza, including British nationals.

Nadav Popplewell, a British national, was confirmed dead in June along with four others kidnapped months after they were captured by Hamas.

The attack by Hamas led to Israeli airstrikes in Gaza which have killed tens of thousands of people in the area illegally blockaded by Israel.

Crowds attended the commemorative event held today, with supporters holding placards with the faces of the hostages still held by Hamas.

They changed ‘bring them home’ in reference to the 101 Israeli hostages still held in Gaza.

Actress Tracy-Ann Oberman told the audience at Hyde Park ‘we must not forget our humanity,’ adding that it was ‘heartening’ to see so many people there who had come to remember ‘our dead’ and ‘our hostages.’

‘We must not forget humanity. Humanity for everyone who is suffering. That is the Jewish way,’ she said.

The crisis has escalated tensions between Israel, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iran, a Hezbollah backer.

Thousands of booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies exploded simultaneously across Lebanon last month, believed to have been planted with explosives by Israeli agents.

It led to airstrikes on both sides of the Lebanon-Israel border, killing hundreds of civilians in Lebanon along with the Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.

Lebanon’s Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib told CNN that Nasrallah had allegedly agreed to a ceasefire just days before he was killed, a claim backed by Lebanon’s ambassador to the UK Rami Mortada.

However, Israel’s ambassador to the UK Tzipi Hotovely has denied this, calling the claims ‘ridiculous’ on Sky News today.

Civilians in Gaza have paid a heavy price for the Israel-Hamas war.

In August, more than 60 people were killed after an Israeli airstrike hit a school-turned-shelter in Gaza City, according to Palestinian health authorities.

Almost the entire population of Gaza – around 1.9 million – have been displaced at least once, forcing families into overcrowded and unsanitary conditions at refugee camps.

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