By Leah Garber
Staff Sergeant (Res.) Chen Gross, 33, a fighter in a commando brigade, fell on Friday alongside three other soldiers in Gaza. They entered a trapped building that exploded, causing the structure to collapse on them. These four joined four others who were killed in combat in Gaza that same week.
Eight times in one week the dreaded knock was heard on parents’ doors, shattering their lives forever. Eight times news headlines screamed: “Cleared for publication,” making an entire nation’s heart skip a beat as we wondered with our breath held who it was this time. Eight radiant faces of our finest young men graced the news broadcasts, reminding us—as if anyone could forget—that after 614 days, the war still rages.
Chen Gross, with his luminous smile, was known for his love of helping others—a courageous fighter, an athlete, a man with a heart of gold who never harmed a soul. At his funeral, his teammate Michael Silem eulogized him as devoted, committed, and brave—a fighter whom everyone would want by their side on the battlefield. But Michael’s eulogy carried a profound lesson: We must remember that we face a fierce enemy who makes no distinction among us and would kill us all given the chance. This team (army-wise) is composed of people from the settlements, kibbutzim, and major towns,” Michael said. “Jews and non-Jews, new immigrants and native-born, who like our ancestor Abraham simply say: ‘Hineni | Here I am.'” He begged us: “Be a little like Chen. He didn’t talk much; he simply acted.”
Our beloved soil—watered with tears of sorrow and the blood of the fallen—grows weary of embracing more brave, young soldiers. Too young, with their whole lives still stretching ahead of them. There is no space left within our earth for more precious casualties. She cannot forever cradle these innocent dreams that will never bloom, plans for entire lives that will never unfold, delicate threads of hope that remain frayed and torn.
Chen, Yoav, Uri Yehonatan, Tom, Alon, Omer, Ofek, and Lior—eight flowers plucked in one week. They now rest with the best that this cursed war has taken, looking down at us from above, urging us to remember that we are all one human fabric, woven from city dwellers and settlers, kibbutz members and Torah scholars, Jews and Arabs, Druze, Bedouins—all human beings. Sparkling souls illuminating the thick darkness that never relents.
As we embrace the wife and daughter of Nattapong Pinta—a 35-year-old foreign worker from Thailand who was kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz and murdered in captivity during the first months of the war, whose body was recovered this week for dignified burial in Thailand—we remember that 55 others still remain behind, waiting in growing despair to return home, to life.
Among them is Matan Angrest, a soldier and tank crewman who was pulled from his tank on October 7 by murderers who carried out a terrible lynching that they themselves documented. This week, his family released the heart-wrenching footage—images of their son, unconscious, wounded, and thrown into a barbaric, jubilant crowd thirsting for blood. They shared these shocking images out of a terrible despair, hoping they might influence decision-makers to see that Matan and the others have no time left, and it is our duty to return them. Now.
As a soldier, Matan underwent additional lynchings during his captivity—these too were documented. He was interrogated and severely tortured. Other hostages who were with him and have since been released testified to the terrible screams of pain they heard during these torture sessions. He was starved, wounded, denied medical treatment, held in solitary confinement without air. He was humiliated. And he wants to come home. Now.
Being a parent is difficult, almost impossible. It includes 24/7 worry for life—sleepless nights when they’re small and sleep-disrupted nights later, waiting for them to return from parties, trips, friends’ homes. Nights are filled with deliberations: Are we good parents? Are we acting correctly, educating properly, raising happy children who will be well-equipped for life?
In Israel, parents carry an additional worry—daughters and sons in the army, no longer under our control. Are they warm enough? Are they eating well, sleeping? How hard are the training exercises? How dangerous is what they’re doing? When will we see them again? What enemy do they face, and what are they required to do to protect their lives, to protect us?
No parent prepares to deal with a kidnapped child—tortured, beaten, starved, clinging to remnants of life on the verge of despair, on the verge of death. Like many others, I am gripped by the trauma of war and anxieties, and I sometimes find myself imagining situations in which I or one of my daughters is a hostage It’s an unbearable, inconceivable thought that, when it filters through, I immediately push away.
Yet here, the 55 hostages—many barely alive—have parents. They have fathers and mothers whose hearts are consumed by worry. Tormented and broken, they yearn every morning for the miracle of their child’s return and every night meet pillows still soaked with tears. Some hostages have partners, children—children who don’t understand how the most moral army in the world can’t manage to bring Daddy home.
The hostage families are superheroes, beyond human. When every breath hurts, when every bite of food is tasteless, when nature’s beautiful blooms only deepen the terrible pit in their souls, how do they hold onto hope alongside the nightmares and the sounds of their children’s breaking voices that pierce the air?
The days remain turbulent with politics that is increasingly disconnected from the people. While Netanyahu and his coalition cling to office, our soldiers—our sons—fight heroically in Gaza, hoping to rescue hostages.
We will not forget Matan, Alon, Yosef, Avinatan, Rom, Elkana, Gali, his brother Ziv, Bipin from Nepal, Guy, Evyatar, Eitan, Maxim, Nimrod, Segev, Eitan, Omri, Tamir, Matan, Ariel, his brother David, or Bar—all barely alive, fighting for every breath. We will not forget them or the rest of the murdered hostages, whose voices cry out to us to bring them home for burial. Not for one single minute will we forget.
Together, united, we will overcome.
Leah Garber is a senior vice president of JCC Association of North America and director of its Center for Israel Engagement in Jerusalem.
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