Israeli laptop warriors fight for hostages taken by Hamas as American father of teenage captive describes his 'living hell'

The last time Ruby Chen heard from his 19-year-old son Itay was a 6:40am message saying his military base was under rocket attack.

His father was just waking up to news that Hamas militants had launched a surprise attack on Israel. 

'That was 12 days ago,' the New York-born father-of-four told DailyMail.com. 'That was the last time we had any communication with him.'

Itay, who holds dual U.S.-Israeli citizenship, is among more than 200 Israelis believed to be held hostage in Gaza by Hamas terrorists or other extremist groups. 

The crisis has triggered an extraordinary response among the Israeli population, uniquely equipped by decades of war to deploy skills learned in the security services or tech industries.

19-year-old Itay Chen was on active duty, as part of a tank unit, close to the border with Gaza when he came under attack on October 7. He is still missing, presumed taken hostage

Chen is one of 203 Israelis thought to be held by terrorists in Gasa. He has dual US-Israeli citizenship, courtesy of his father, who is from Brooklyn, New York

A campaign to keep the hostages' plight in the headlines has drawn 1000 volunteers together, coordinating international protests and social medial campaigns from the glitzy offices of a law firm in a Tel Aviv high-rise tower block.

And across the city there are at least two efforts by tech experts to use the latest in geo-location technology and artificial intelligence to find clues from videos posted by Hamas that might aid a rescue mission.

Karine Nahon, an academic in information science, is one of the leaders of a team poring over video footage posted online by Hamas. They are using A.I. coupled with facial and voice recognition software to identify the missing and zero in on locations.

'The government right now relies on the information that is coming from these rooms,' Nahon told Reuters. 

Some 1500 tech experts are working in a war room set up in Tel Aviv Expo Center. 

Another war room is operating across town in the offices of Gittam BBDO, an advertising agency run by a former member of the Shin Bet, Israel's domestic security service.

Some of its volunteers have experience in 8200, the Israeli military’s cyberintelligence division, as well as Duvdevan, the undercover counterterrorism unit which was the inspiration for the Netflix series Fauda.

They described to the Washington Post how one set of videos showing a hostage being led by gunmen in Gaza showed a phone number displayed on a wall. The number was for a business, allowing the team to home in on a neighborhood in the Gazan city of Khan Younis.

Professor Karine Nahon is head of a missing civilians war room at Tel Aviv Expo Center

Tel Aviv is plastered with images of the hostages, part of a huge campaign to keep pressure on the government to make sure they are brought safely home

'We’re figuring all of this out as we go,' said one volunteer who declined to give his name because he is a reservist with Duvdevan.

And then there is the P.R. push run from the seventh-floor lawyers' offices in Museum Tower, where floor to ceiling windows let light cascade through the operation.

If you have seen pictures of protests in New York or Australia they may have originated in the conference room here that hosts the international committee of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.

Another room is used by the medical team, which documents medications needed urgently by missing people.

There's an influencers room, creating video clips and memes to send to influential social medial users.

Former diplomats use another conference room, exploiting their connections with foreign governments to call in favors.

Families of hostages come and go all day. The forum operates as media booker, helping coordinate interviews as they keep their cases in the headlines, as well as providing emotional support, practical help and information about their loved ones.

Families of the hostages participate in a special 'Kabalat Shabbat' prayer service next to a 'Shabbat Dinner' table set up in the Tel Aviv museum plaza, with 200 empty seats, representing the hostages and missing people on October 20, 2023

They said prayers and sang at a table set for more than 200 missing people

Photographs of the missing printed by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum as part of their campaign to keep the hostages in the public eye

Wellwishers arrive in the spacious lobby with trays of cookies, kebabs and flat bread all day long.

On Friday, the world's media descended to a plaza below, where a table was laid for the traditional Jewish Friday night Shabbat dinner. It included an empty place for all 203 of the people believed to have been kidnapped.

Some of the places were set for high chairs, reflecting the 20 children among the hostages.

A couple of dozen relatives of the missing said prayers and sang in between cascades of tears.

The idea was to illustrate the fragility of family, said Ophyr Hanan, a 26-year with a B.A. in communications and a job at the website building platform WIX. 

'We started as a group of volunteers on behalf of the families and that's how we remain,' she told DailyMail.com. 'We are a headquarters for the families of hostages and the missing. 

'We're here to help them in any way that we can.'

Part of that means keeping up pressure on the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is already accused of letting down the nation by failing to prevent the Hamas attack. 

There was some good news on Friday evening, when Hamas announced it had freed an American mother and daughter. 

Ruby Chen, with another son Roy in New York, said time was not on the side of hostages and their families

'Time is not on our side,' said Chen, as he described the trauma faced by all the families.

'You wake up in the morning and think are in a bad nightmare. Then you understand it's real, like getting  a slap n the face, as you figure out this is some bizarro universe that we are in.

'It's living hell, you have a black hole in your stomach.'

Giving up is not an option when it comes to Hamas, he added.

'You know what happens when you stand still in hell? You get burned,' he said. 

'So we need to keep walking. Keep on doing what we can to amplify this message tto make sure that the global community knows there are people out who did crimes against humanity. All of us.'