Mrs. Sharabi spread her arms wide. “I should ask questions? Who gave me these children in the first place? They were gifts from the Borei Olam”

Eitan Mor, surrounded by throngs of happy well-wishers on his return to Kiryat Arba. When he stood in “his” shul reciting Bircas Hagomel, a circle closed

On Simchas Torah 2023, as the illusion of control was shattered, Jews all over began to reconnect with their core identity. Hashem drew me into the saga as well, allowing me to stand alongside survivors and hostage families in their darkest hours. Then came the book — not a rehashing of the news, but a story that will be etched in the gold letters of Jewish history, deepening the bonds that connect us to one another and to our Father in Heaven.

With the release of the remaining hostages, many of the stories have since had a happy ending, while others have had tragic closure. Either way, it’s my privilege to continue to share them with you.

IT was the week before Purim of 2024, a little over five months since the Simchas Torah massacre, and I was invited to join in a very special Shabbos for hostage families. But I was nervous: I thought it would be one big traumatic event, with tears and crying and inconsolable loved ones, some of whom had never experienced an authentic Shabbos before. My wife and two daughters joined me, but instead of overwhelming heartache, we were met with hope and emunah from the most surprising quarters.

The first to speak was Mrs. Chana Sharabi, a petite, elderly woman with piercing black eyes. “I have five children,” she began. “Two of them, Eli and Yossi, built families in Be’eri.

“On Simchat Torah, Eli was in the safe room with his wife, Lianne, and their daughters, Noya and Yahel. The three of them were murdered, and Eli was taken to Gaza. Yossi was taken, too, but after a while it was confirmed that he’d been murdered in captivity. Our rav instructed us to sit shivah, so we did. He did not merit a levayah, or even a burial….”

Around me, every head was bowed. How do you contain such anguish?

“And where do you draw your strength from, Mrs. Sharabi?” Tzili Shneider, Kesher Yehudi director and shabbaton organizer, asked gently. “How is it that you don’t ask questions?”

Mrs. Sharabi spread her thin arms wide. “I should ask questions? Who gave me these children in the first place? They were gifts from the Borei Olam.” She pointed upward. “He decided when they would be here and He decided when it was time to take them back. Hashem Yitbarach decides, not me.

“You know,” she continued, her voice steady with ironclad faith, “There were revealed nissim as well. Yossi’s wife, Nira, managed to escape with her three daughters. She hid in a burnt house the terrorists had already abandoned. She was also able to hide an elderly neighbor and his caregiver, along with five others. They stayed hidden for eight hours and emerged without a scratch.

“Every day, every moment since that Shabbat, I have prayed for a sign of life from Eli, but I never forget that only He decides.”

And she stepped off the stage.

[B’chasdei Hashem, Eli Sharabi was released in the hostage deal of February 2025 after 491 days chained in harrowing captivity; Yossi Sharabi’s body was returned on October 15, as part of the US-brokered ceasefire.]

Among the many people we spoke to that Shabbos was Efrat Mor of Kiryat Arba, whose son Eitan was one of the 20 final hostages released last month. Back then, though, she and her husband, Tzvika Mor, who headed the right-wing hostage family Tikvah Forum, had no idea about his fate.

“Eitan spent Rosh Hashanah with us,” she related about Eitan, the oldest of eight, who had chosen a different path from that of his Torah-observant family, “and at some point, he casually mentioned, ‘Abba, Ima, you may not have noticed, but I transferred a thousand shekels as a contribution to our shul.’ We were stunned. You see, our shul was established during Covid and has been in a temporary tent since. We’ve been dreaming of a permanent structure that doesn’t flood during the winter rains.”

She told us about Eitan’s warm heart. About how, one Friday afternoon, he noticed she was exhausted from preparations.

“ ‘Okay, Ima, I’m here now. Sit down and don’t get up!’ he told me, then cleaned, organized, and prepared without resting a minute. He always had incredible kibbud horim.”

“Did you know right away that something had happened?” I asked, my heart clenching.

She shook her head. “Eitan wasn’t with us for Simchat Torah. After the chag, my brother-in-law Yossi called, asking us if we’d heard from him, if we had any idea where he was. Apparently, as soon as the attack began, Eitan and his friends, who were working as security guards at the Nova, grabbed their weapons and ran to rescue whoever they could. Realizing that it was pikuach nefesh, Eitan sent a message to his uncle Yossi for reinforcements. That was the last contact anyone had.

“The uncertainty and confusion of those early days were unbearable. Eitan was declared missing, and we didn’t know where to put ourselves. We searched everywhere for a shred of information. Slowly, news came from survivors who contacted us. They said Eitan had found an ATV on the roadside and used it to evacuate the wounded — driving back into the danger area again and again to save more lives.

“Later, security guards told us they had been moving people to safety when Eitan spotted two dead bodies and stopped. He and his good friend Elyakim Liebman told the group to go on without them. The others protested, insisting they abandon the bodies. They were under fire, after all, and there was no one left to save. But Eitan and Elyakim insisted. They felt morally bound to protect the dignity of the dead, to ensure the bodies wouldn’t fall into terrorist hands and be desecrated. With incredible courage, they placed the first body in a pit, then hurried to the second. From there… they never came back.

“Do you realize,” she continued softly, “that the last thing he did was so noble, so Jewish… so typical of my Eitan.”

Eitan was taken captive, and for close to a year, it was thought that his childhood friend Elyakim was being held hostage as well. But because of the unspeakable brutality of the murders, new evidence indicated that there had been a mistake in the burial of the victims, causing the authorities to recheck certain graves. Through DNA testing, they discovered Elyakim’s body buried along with another victim, Hashem yikom damam.

Efrat Mor, though, never fell into despair. “Throughout these months of waiting, of worrying, of imagining the worst, most horrific scenarios — just imagining what Eitan is living through — I’ve felt how small I am and how great HaKadosh Baruch Hu is,” Efrat told us. “How precise everything is. It’s true that we didn’t choose this. We were chosen, against our will, to be the family of a hostage. I’m sure it wasn’t by chance. Hashem is sending us a message. I’m still trying to figure out what He wants from me, but I’m sure there is something.

“And yet I continue to be strengthened. When I hear of another Jewish woman keeping Shabbos because of me… lighting candles… taking on an improvement in tzniyut or being mafrish challah… when I hear about children doing acts of kindness as a merit for Eitan… when our emunah gives others strength — that uplifts me. And I know it’s important to Eitan that we be strong, that we find reasons to be happy and to go on.”

Later, she told us how they were close to realizing a vision: Jews from all over the world had begun donating toward a permanent shul, as a zechus for Eitan Avraham ben Efrat.

“My dream,” she said back then, “is to see Eitan standing there, along with all the hostages, wearing talleisim, their faces shining. He will recite Bircat Hagomel and we will all answer Amen. Right there, in the shul he wanted so much to build.”

That was more than a year and a half ago. And last week, her dream came true. On Shabbos, parshas Lech Lecha, Eitan stood in front of the aron kodesh and recited Bircas Hagomel in the shul that was built in his honor during those two horrifying years of captivity, dodging the candies being thrown at him as he publicly thanked Hashem for all the miracles that brought him to where he is now.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1086)