KFAR AZA, Israel: Two years after he survived Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel which killed 64 fellow residents of the Kfar Aza kibbutz, Avidor Schwartzman hopes his community can finally begin to overcome its pain.
“We can start the healing process,” Schwartzman told AFP, even if “we know that there are a lot of people who will not come back.”
On October 7, 2023, Hamas commandos stormed over the barrier separating Gaza and Israel, around two kilometers (just over a mile) away from Schwartzman’s kibbutz.
The militants set about burning down homes, looting and killing, before abducting 18 people from Kfar Aza and taking them hostage into the Gaza Strip.
Two of them died in captivity, while the last two to be released, Gali and Ziv Berman, were only returned by Hamas on Monday under a US-brokered deal to end the war in Gaza.
It took two days for the Israeli army to regain control of the kibbutz following the October 7 attack, and the violence killed 19 soldiers.
On Thursday, survivors of the attack in Kfar Aza gathered in the cemetery for a memorial to honor those killed that day.
At a state ceremony in Jerusalem to mark the second anniversary of the attack under the Jewish calendar, a torch was lit in memory of a young couple from the kibbutz, Sivan Elkabetz and Naor Hasidim, both killed by militants.
- ‘Gives us hope -
Elkabetz’s father, Shimon Elkabetz, told AFP that the return of the surviving hostages on Monday sparked hope.
But he was of the view that the Israeli army should not leave Gaza “until the last of the (dead) hostages is back to be buried in Israel.”
Israel has accused Hamas of violating the terms of the ceasefire agreement, under which the militants had until noon Monday (0900 GMT) to hand over all the hostages it still held in Gaza.
While Hamas handed over all 20 living hostages by the deadline, the group has only handed over nine of the 28 bodies, arguing it would need specialist equipment to retrieve the rest from Gaza’s ruins.
Israel’s defense minister on Wednesday threatened to restart the offensive if Hamas did not honor the deal.
Elkabetz agreed.
“Our soldiers are deep inside the Strip, and that is a good thing,” he said.
- ‘No home anymore’ -
At the Kfar Aza memorial, people placed flowers on the tombs of victims of the Hamas attack. Others, as per Jewish custom, laid stones.
On stage, survivors read out the names of the 64 victims, the noise of helicopters and drones overhead at times drowning out their voices.
Batia Holin could not hide her pain for “64 of my friends are gone, murdered.”
Reconstruction work has begun, though much of the kibbutz is still damaged and only a handful of residents have come back to live in Kfar Aza.
Holin, who has lived in Kfar Aza for 50 years, said she was struggling to imagine what the future might hold.
“I can’t go to my home because I have no home anymore. It will take more two years maybe, and it’s very difficult,” she told AFP.
In April, the kibbutz opened a new neighborhood of 16 housing units earmarked for younger people, to replace the old youth quarter destroyed in the attack.
Schwartzman, at 40 a father of two, lives in the neighborhood. His wife lost both her parents in the October 7 attack.
While the road to recovery will be long, he says he is confident that others will follow and move back, like he has.
Several people he knew, Schwartzman said, had been “living here for several generations, three generations, maybe even four...
“So I guess this is the only place they can call home and that’s why they want to come back.”
