Lesley Stahl, a journalist from 60 Minutes, is facing criticism for her interactions with a Hamas hostage. Many social media users are expressing outrage, claiming that Stahl displayed sympathy towards the terrorist organization.

Online critics bashed Stahl for her question to former hostage Keith Siegel, where she inquired whether Hamas intentionally deprived him of food or if they simply did not have any to provide.

Following Siegel’s account of his captors becoming harsher after his wife Aviva’s release, Stahl posed the question, “Do you think they starved you because or they just didn’t have food?”

Seigel, who spent 484 days in captivity, replied: ‘No, I think they starved me, and they would often eat in front of me and not offer me food.’

Several pro-Israel X accounts have shared the exchange and accused Stahl of defending the Islamic terrorists. 

The ‘Jew Fight Back account’ wrote: ‘Shame on 60 Minutes. Shame on CBS. And shame on every apologist who still can’t admit that Hamas is pure evil.’

Conservative journalist Ari Hoffman added: ‘Lesley Stahl & CBS should be ashamed of themselves. Throughout the interviews with the released hostages, Stahl used Hamas data & talking points… She should ask the Nazis if they meant to starve the Jews in the Holocaust or didn’t have enough aid.’

60 Minutes host Lesley Stahl is facing backlash over her treatment of an Israeli who was kept hostage by Hamas for over a year

‘Do you think they starved you because or they just didn’t have food?’ Stahl asked Keith Seigel

Keith Siegel (pictured embracing his wife Aviva after his release)  claimed that hostages were permitted to shower once monthly using a bucket of cold water and a small cup

Former White House staffer Kayleigh McEnany said: ‘At one point [Stahl] cuts in on a hostage describing his starvation and beating to ask: “Do you think they [Hamas terrorists] starved you or they just didn’t have food?” WHAT’

StopAntisemitism wrote: ‘Ridiculous moment on @60Minutes: Lesley Stahl asks hostage Keith Siegel if Hamas starved him because they had no food. He shuts her down. Hamas not only starved him, they ate in front of him, mocked him, sexually humiliated him, and forced him to watch female hostages being tortured.’

Seigel, 65, was violently abducted alongside his wife Aviva from their house in Kibbutz Nir Oz when Hamas launched its October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

On Sunday’s episode of 60 Minutes, the veteran journalist spoke to several Israeli hostages who were recently freed by Hamas including  Yarden Bibas, whose young sons Ariel and Kfir become a symbol of Israeli suffering in the war.

Bibas echoed the terror that Siegel said he endured and claimed that his captors repeatedly taunted him over his family’s fate.

‘They were murdered in cold blood. Bare hands,’ he said of his wife Shiri, four-year-old Ariel and baby Kfir, adding: ‘[Hamas] used to tell me “It doesn’t matter. You’ll get a new wife, new kids. Better wife, better kids.”‘

Seigel told Stahl he was left gasping for breath’ and ‘feeling life-threatened’ as they were forced into a vehicle, driven to Gaza and taken through a tunnel by armed terrorists.

He said he was beaten, starved and forced to watch ‘very cruel and very violent’ terrorists assault other hostages.

‘I witnessed a young woman who was being tortured by the terrorists. I mean literal torture, not just in the figurative sense,’ he said. ‘I saw sexual assault with female hostages.’ 

He claimed that hostages were permitted to shower once monthly using a bucket of cold water and a small cup.

Hamas also shaved the heads and genital regions of their male captives, Siegel claimed, revealing that he ‘felt humiliated’.

He said how he felt ‘completely dependent’ on his captors and suggested they used that dependency to ‘torture me in a psychological way’.

Siegel noted that Hamas had left him alone on several occasions, which would leave him feeling ‘very, very scared that maybe they won’t come back’.

Yarden Bibas (pictured Sunday during his first media interview since being freed in a ceasefire last month) also called on US President Donald Trump to bring an end to the war in Gaza, claiming that Trump is ‘the only one’ who can convince Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas to halt the renewed fighting

Yarden Bibas – whose sons Ariel, 4, and Kfir, 10 months, become a symbol of Israeli suffering in the war – says Hamas told him ‘you’ll get a better wife and kids’ when his family were murdered. Bibas (left) is pictured with his wife Shiri (right) and their sons Ariel and Kfir

He said he would ask himself ‘Should I try to escape?’ but noted that even his captors knew ‘I wouldn’t dare to do that because I needed them’.

The freed hostage, who broke down in tears as he gave his interview, added that even after his release he spends most of his time worrying about the hostages that are still being held captive in Gaza.

DailyMail.com has reached out to CBS News for comment on this story.