After trying the saferoom door one more time, they climbed onto the roof and set up a firing position. Nir took me up to the roof and showed me a heap of bullet casings left behind by the terrorists. They had spent hours sitting right above his head, firing at the security forces as they finally approached. This went on for 14 hours.

“Nir,” I asked him, “how did you stay sane?”

And this kibbutznik went on to teach me a lesson in emunah. Without ever mentioning Hashem — they’re less inclined to do that on the kibbutz — he gave me a powerful insight about Hashgachah pratis and human nature.

Nir is a physical therapist who often works with people recovering from serious accidents. While his focus is on healing their physical injuries, many of his clients are also emotionally shattered, struggling with post-trauma.

Over time, he noticed something striking: The trauma isn’t always rooted in what had happened; sometimes, it stems from a desperate attempt to rewrite the past. Again and again, those suffering replay the critical moments, thinking how they could have done it differently.

One of his patients had been on the phone while driving, lost control of the car and was seriously injured. He shared with Nir that he was mentally reliving that moment a hundred times a day. He kept imagining himself putting the phone down, keeping both hands on the wheel, and making it safely to his destination.

Nir was aware that if he allowed himself to spiral into pointless self-blame — Why did I stay home for the chag? Why did I go into the saferoom instead of hiding in the bushes? Why didn’t I take my son with me (his 15-year-old son Amit was taken to Gaza and released 50 days later)? — the emotional scars would stay with him forever.

So he told himself: There’s only one question that matters right now. If the terrorists win, I won’t be here. And if I survive, it means I’ve defeated them.

That thought is what carried him through, and when he was finally rescued, he didn’t feel like a victim. He felt like a victor.

On Kibbutz Be’eri, I learned how emunah sustains people.

A person who constantly eats his heart out—Why did I move to this neighborhood? Why did I marry my spouse? Or even, How could I have missed my bus? — will live in a state of unrelenting heartache.

But a Jew who knows there are no mistakes, no miscalculations — he firmly believes that every decision and every moment was orchestrate by our compassionate Father in Heaven — will stay afloat even when struck by a harsh gezeirah.

When I was asked to come spend Shabbos with the families, I asked what they wanted me to speak about.

They said, “Talk about emunah.”

I hesitated. If they believed that Sinwar yimach shemo was to blame, or the chief-of-staff, the head of the Shabak, the prime minister, the army, or the failed “smart fence,” then it was clear what their response should be: Replace the leadership, identify those at fault, let heads roll, stage demonstrations, lash out in anger.

And I should come and tell them that HaKadosh Baruch Hu was behind it all?

I feared their reaction — I thought they’d be furious. But I was wrong. I found people far from Yiddishkeit who, in their anguish, had rediscovered their Father in Heaven. They knew He was the One behind it all, and because they knew, they turned to Him in prayer.

One of those people who found their faith is a young man I’ve been learning with regularly ever since I met him at a Kesher Yehudi shabbaton. His name is Uri Chanan, and he was at the Nova festival with three friends that fateful Simchas Torah morning. When the music shut down, they weren’t exactly sure what was happening, but they found out soon enough when their car was ambushed by a band of terrorists who unloaded dozens of rounds on them. One friend, Bar Shechter, the driver, was killed instantly, and the other, Asaf Oren, was losing blood from a serious gunshot wound after he and Uri — who was lightly injured — managed to dive under the car that had rolled into a ditch and play dead so the terrorists wouldn’t finish them off.

In those minutes, Uri began to talk to Hashem, with whom he’d never had a conversation before. He promised that if he and his friend would be saved, he’d put on tefillin every day and keep Shabbos three times. And then, somehow, the terrorists moved away from where the two were hiding, and Uri managed to flag down an Israeli driver who ferried them to safety.

But what about Uri’s promise? He related that he didn’t know where to even get tefillin or how to put them on, and he knew nothing about Shabbos. But then, a relative gave him tefillin, and he heard about a Shabbos program for Nova survivors sponsored by Kesher Yehudi, and he joined, together with a recovered Asaf Oren.

Uri and I have been chavrusas since. He says the loss of his friend is still searing, but that day he also got his life back in a whole new way – he was saved by a miracle and discovered an entire world of Torah and mitzvos that he never knew existed. Uri kept his part of the deal and managed to keep Shabbos three times, although he says it’s still a struggle. “But today,” he says, “that struggle comes not from being forced, but from love of the Borei Olam.”

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1084)