As terrible as it’s been for the families to live through this experience, it’s inspiring to know that love like theirs exists.
500 days ago, hundreds of Hamas terrorists infiltrated villages, homes, safe rooms, military bases, and a music festival in southern Israel, hoping to kill as many civilians as possible. Terrorists slaughtered more than 1,200 people and took 254 hostage.
Romi Gonen was taken by Hamas from the Nova music festival. When paragliders first attacked Nova, firing shots into the crowd, festival-goers ran to their cars. Terrorists shot mercilessly at those who tried to flee; the road leading out of Re’im, where the festival was held, became known as the “murder road.” There’s a parking lot near Re’im in Tkuma full of hundreds of cars recovered from that day. Some are burned, many are filled with bullet holes, and nearly all are vehicles in which young adults trying to escape were brutally murdered or taken hostage. Footage from Hamas bodycams on October 7 show terrorists shooting people in their cars, as they ran from their cars, as they hid behind their cars, and as they dragged their already-wounded selves on the ground away from their cars.
To attempt to escape by car meant near-certain death. So Romi tried to hide from the carnage in a bush. She was on the phone with her mother and sister for nearly five hours, hiding, until terrorists found her. Only twenty-three at the time, Romi was shot in the hand, before terrorists dragged her into Gaza, where they gave her something to clean the wound and no painkillers. They “stood around and laughed at her [open wound],” Romi’s mother said. Romi was released from captivity on January 19, 2025, 471 days after October 7.
Romi’s story is so well known because, like many hostage families, Romi’s siblings, parents, and loved ones have, for the past 500 days, been fighting like hell to get media, political leaders, and citizens of the world to pay attention to Romi’s plight. Romi’s sister Yarden visited Washington, D.C. in December of last year, weeks before her sister was released. She told National Review at the time that “these are monsters that are currently holding my sister. They’re starving everyone, they’re mentally and physically abusing everyone, and they are sexually abusing everyone.”
Yarden was beautiful, and had a memorable style and full curls. She spoke as though she knew no one else would tell her sister’s story — with force, conviction, and love. She sounded certain that her sister would come home. When Romi was released on January 19, Yarden was there, and in photos of Romi’s homecoming, Yarden’s full curls and bright smile are on full display (Yarden is on the far left in the cover photo from this Times of Israel story). It was one thing for me to recognize Romi; it was another to recognize, and know on some level, the family members who surrounded her.
Delegations of hostage families from Israel, like the one Yarden traveled with, have traveled to America dozens of times to tell their loved ones’ stories. The families of the men, women, and children kidnapped from Israel on October 7 are some of the bravest individuals in the world. They invited anyone who would listen into their souls, their minds, and their families. Their sisters, daughters, grandfathers, nephews, and mothers have become in some ways our own.
Think of the courage it would take to detail the five-hour long call your daughter or sister made to you as she was hiding from murderers. Or the strength it would take to tell that story, over and over again, to people who don’t always believe that your daughter or sister deserved to live. Families have had to live through the daily anguish of not knowing if their loved ones were alive, maimed, or tortured, and they also decided to share that anguish with the world, because they knew that showing the world the depth of their sorrow might help the hostages. And it did.
Released hostages have said that they knew their families and friends were fighting for them. That in captivity, they caught glimpses of “Bring Them Home Now” protests. That it gave them strength to survive another day of being starved in tunnels.
Romi’s story is just one of too many. Yarden asked me, while she was in D.C.: “Do you have a sister?” I do. “You know what it would be like then,” she said.
So few people know what it would be like to have a family member ripped away from them by bloodthirsty jihadists. But we all know the love of a sister, brother, parent, or grandparent. You can imagine what it would be like for the girl you used to play make-believe with in the backyard to call you from a concert, telling you she’d been shot and that she might die.
As terrible as it’s been for the families to live through this experience, it’s inspiring to know that love like theirs exists. Love that does not give up — that does not rest. Thank you, to the families, for letting us into your homes 500 days ago, even though you never should have had to.