Them hard times spent by his nine-year-old daughter Emily Hunt at the hands of Hamas while himself he thought she was deadThomas Hunt’s father describes in an interview with CNN.

As he himself said, Emily thought he was being held hostage for an entire yearhe even has trouble sleeping and cries every night when he lies down.

“It’s scary. She was probably being pulled, dragged, pushed… under fire.”, her father said today, Tuesday, pointing out that now the nine-year-old is gradually starting to speak and describe what she went through at the hands of Hamas. Emily was released last Saturday and as she said among the few words is that “no one hit us”.

“It’s slowly opening up, little by little,” Hunt said.

“We’ll only know what really happened as it opens”he told CNN. “I want to know so much information… but you have to let them, when they are ready, they will talk.”

Thomas Hunt reported that he was shocked at the image of his daughter upon seeing her after so many days in captivity.

“It was only when she stepped back that I could see her chiseled facelike mine, whereas before it was a chubby, girlish, young child’s face”. Like the other hostages, Emily has lost weight and Hunt said he had never seen her so pale.

“The most shocking – disturbing part of their meeting was that he was just whispering, you couldn’t hear her. I had to put my ear to her lips,” he said. “They had set her up to make no noise” he added.

When he asked her how long he thought he was a hostage the nine year old replied “a year”.

“Besides the whispers, this was a punch. One year.”

Alongside, her father said that as soon as Emily lays down in her bed to sleep, she cries.

“Last night she cried until her face turned red, she couldn’t stop. He didn’t want any comfort, I guess he’s forgotten how to comfort himself”, says Hunt. “She went under the covers of the bed, under the duvet, covered herself and cried quietly.”

She didn’t want to be touched so Hunt waited until she was ready to touch her again. “She’s a very determined little girl, very strong,” she said.

Emily’s mother died of cancer when Emily was two years old.