When the first hostages are released by Hamas in Gaza, taken into Israel and transferred by helicopter to the Rabin Medical Center in Petah Tikva, Dr Mikhal Steinman will take them up to the sixth floor, swipe open the glass door and see them reunite with their closest family after more than 700 days in captivity.
"It is a privilege," says the head of nursing. "These are the moments, when I'm 70 or 80, these are the two or three moments I will remember. They symbolise so many values – as a nurse, as a mother, as a woman, as an Israeli."
Twenty living hostages are due to be released under the terms of the agreement between Israel and Hamas. Several of them will be brought to this hospital.
It will be the third time that the hostages' unit has gone operational after the two previous hostage releases in November 2023 and January this year. The BBC visited the unit on Saturday, when the medical team learned the identities of the hostages they would be treating.
"There is no such field as captivity medicine, and we are inventing it," said Dr Steinman told the BBC on Saturday, after the team learned the identities of the hostages they would be treating.
