Hostages, Horror, and Hope: A Visit to Nir Oz

I needed to reconnect to October 7^th and its horrors, and went down South with a group of Yeshiva University rabbinical alumni. We went to Ofakim, Sderot, and the Nova festival site, but it was the visit to Kibbutz Nir Oz which shook me to the core. Nir Oz was the hardest hit kibbutz in terms of numbers—over 25% of its residents were murdered or kidnapped on October 7^th.

Our tour guide was Amit Rubin, a child of Kibbutz Nir Oz who now lives in nearby Nir Yitzchak. Rubin gives us two ominous bits of information to keep in mind throughout the tour. “First, unlike most kibbutzim, there was not a single bullet, let alone tank shells, fired by the IDF in Nir Oz. The terrorists freely finished their murderous rampage and hostage-taking, leaving 15 minutes before the IDF arrived. Every bit of devastation you will see was from Hamas. Second, whatever you see is the ‘cleaned-up’ version. Know that it was 100x worse in late October.”

I’ve interviewed Rabbi Prof. Steinberg who described unprecedented difficulties identifying DNA due to burnt victims. I’ve seen pictures of burnt kibbutz homes and other pictures of fatal house fires. But I never imagined what I saw, felt, and smelled that day.

Homes were not burnt. They were utterly incinerated.

Some homes were “merely” ransacked and destroyed. These homes still had kitchens, just with shattered china and glassware all over the floor. Or they still had safe rooms, just with blood all over the floor.

But some homes were just ash. No counters, no walls, no beds, just ash.

Death was our constant companion. Everywhere one looked, the remnants of Death stared back. If I closed my eyes, I felt Death.

Listening to Amit Rubin I get the impression that he was in the peace camp until October 7^th. But now, “peace activist” is almost a dirty phrase, said with deep bitterness.

Like every other Israeli, I see hostage posters everywhere in my day-to-day life. But realizing that the posters before me now were on the victims’ very own homes—on the front doors of the very house from which they were kidnapped—sent a shiver went down my spine. Rubin hustled us from home to home, giving the briefest of snapshots of what happened to each family, with nary a moment to process.

Oded and Yocheved Lifschitz. “Oded came home from the hospital the night before. He was a peace activist, who even drove Gazans to Israeli hospitals.”

Chana Katzir. “Total vandalism,” Rubin tells us. As if murder, kidnapping, and rape weren’t bad enough, Rubin wants us to notice utter randomness to their violence, the craving to destroy and vandalize. “So-called ‘innocent’ civilians—women and children—came gleefully, looted, set fire to houses.”

Yair and Eitan Horn. “Eitan was just visiting Yair for the holiday; now the two brothers are held hostage in Gaza.”

Maya and Avner Goren. “The daycare teacher, she was outside early and one of the first kidnapped. Her husband’s body was found a week later, on the border.” A sign hung on the door asking people not to enter. While we freely entered other homes, the Goren kids grasped for a vestige of privacy from having unknown guests see the intimate space of a home, including bedrooms, in its humiliating state.

Shalev Tal. “Archeologists and forensic scientists are still working through the ash here to identify remains. Some of his family members’ fate remains unknown.”

Siman-Tov. This family of five was murdered in its entirety.

Kfir and Ariel Bibas

Bibas. Silence. Nothing needs to be said. We all know about one-year-old Kfir, the youngest hostage, and his brother Ariel. Touching Ariel’s riding toy, the same exact kind my toddler rides, pierces their story deeper into my heart.

After barely one to two minutes per home, Rubin was walking briskly on to the next one. Too much to see in too little time.

But at one home, finally, a story was told.

It was one of the incinerated, ash-only homes. Even the porcelain toilet had partially melted.

“Two couples were here,” says Rubin, “a young couple and an elderly couple, one of whom had dementia. They hid in the safe room, each couple huddled in one bed, under a blanket. Terrorists came in the house and turned it into a base of operations of sorts. Many terrorists went in and out, asking for commands or taking eating breaks. Suddenly, a terrorist went to check the safe room but after a quick look he left. A different terrorist rebuked him for not looking carefully enough and went to check himself. Inexplicably, he too, neglected to feel the blankets or even turn on the light.

After an unknown period of time, the terrorists decided they were done using the home. Before they left, they set the house on fire, “for fun.” The two couples struggled to breathe but hearing terrorists outside the window, there was no escape. After enduring as much suffering as they could handle, they decided to escape. Outside there was a chance of survival while inside there was none. And if their fate was to die, better it be instantaneous via gunshots than the unimaginable suffering of burning to death.

The younger couple helped the elderly people climb out. They tried to hide behind a shed but were fully exposed from one side, while terrorists continued roaming around, even looting that very shed which hid them. By a total miracle, they went unnoticed and survived.

“I know all this,” Rubin concluded, “because the young couple is my daughter and her boyfriend, and the elderly couple are my parents.”

The house of Amit Rubin’s parents

How are his parents doing now? “Not well,” says Rubin. “It’s too much for them to bear.”

In one home I noticed a newspaper strewn about the rubble on the floor. I knelt down to flip it over and the date jumped out at me like a punch in the gut. October 6^th, 2023. Even more eerie was a poster in the kibbutz dining hall announcing a protest kibbutz members would be attending on October 7^th. The target of the protest? Evacuation of Judean and Samarian towns to advance peace with the Palestinians.

This is only half of the story. The other half will be told in years to come, but it has already started. A rebuilding campaign has been launched and Nir Oz is determined to see it through. “There is a determination to rebuild,” Rubin declares. The only two other people we saw during the two-hour tour of the kibbutz were planting flowers, and others have started working the agricultural land nearby which is the kibbutz’s primary income. Rubin stresses his final message: Kibbutz Nir Oz is not going anywhere.

Featured image: Joel Pollak, Breitbart News