While the names and faces of some of the hostages, particularly the younger ones, have become familiar in Israel and around the world, others may not be so well known.
Retired journalist Oded Lifshitz, who turned 84 in May, is one such hostage.
He and his wife, Yocheved, were brutally taken from their home on Kibbutz Nir Oz by Hamas terrorists on October 7. Yocheved was released from captivity after 17 days. Now, some 10 months later, Oded’s precise whereabouts are still unknown, as is his condition. There is also some doubt about whether he is alive.
In a recent interview with the couple’s London-based daughter, award-winning artist and filmmaker Sharone Lifshitz, The Jerusalem Report found out more about her remarkable peace activist father and the horrors that he and his wife endured.
In the weeks following the Hamas attack, when Sharone was facing the heartbreaking prospect of losing both parents, her mother was released on October 23.
“It was incredible,” Sharone recalled. “She was reborn. She came out of the ground reborn.”
Although Yocheved was held separately from her husband, making it impossible for her to relay news about him upon her release, she was able to confirm details about her capture and her time in captivity, as well as information on some of her fellow hostages.
Kidnapped in just her pajamas without shoes or her spectacles, Yocheved was taken into Gaza on the back of a motorbike, flanked by two Nukhba terrorists from Hamas’s military wing. Upon entering the Gaza Strip, Gazan civilians lined the streets, threatening her with knives and sticks. Ironically, the terrorists fought off the baying mob in a bid to keep their prized possession, an Israeli hostage, safe.
Before long, Yocheved arrived at the mouth of a tunnel, where she was greeted by a few familiar faces from her kibbutz. Yocheved walked, barefoot and bleeding, with the other hostages through the lengthy tunnels, until they reached their destination: a specially prepared room where they were to be held. Mattresses were scattered on the floor, and food – mainly pita, cheese, and cucumbers – was provided twice a day.
Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar visited them a couple of days later, with assurances that no harm would come to them, as there would soon be a deal where they would be released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners being held in Israeli prisons. After that, they could all go home, he said.
SADLY, ALTHOUGH Yocheved was released some two and a half weeks later, during which time no significant harm came to her, the same cannot be said for the other hostages, 115 of whom, including her husband, are still being held captive.
We now know from other hostages – who have since been released (as part of a deal in November) or rescued in dangerous missions by the IDF – that the cruelty meted out to the captives has been brutal and sustained. Many have suffered physical and sexual abuse, including rape and mental torture. An unspecified number have been murdered.
Sharone Lifshitz: The outlook for hostages is grim
The outlook for the hostages who remain in Gaza is grim, and worsening by the day, Sharone said as she recounted her father’s tale.
In the immediate aftermath of the Hamas attack, she presumed he had been murdered. She then got word through the hostages who were subsequently released that he had been spotted in a hospital in Gaza, which gave her hope.
That, however, didn’t prevent her from lamenting the government’s failure to seize upon the opportunities to secure the release of the hostages at the start of the war.
“Israel wasted a lot of goodwill because, in the beginning, we had opportunities to release them that were wasted,” she explained. “We know there were deals on the table, and if Israel had agreed [the hostages would be home].”
Such deals to secure the return of the hostages, she fears, are incompatible with the ultimate aim of the war: The destruction of Hamas.
Accordingly, her father, along with the other 114 hostages, many of whom are now known to have died, remain in captivity, with no end in sight to the suffering of their families and to those who remain alive.
For Sharone and the other hostages’ families, the relentless, uphill struggle to save their loved ones is what keeps them going.
“We must not let the story fade,” she asserted. “Which is hard, as our loved ones are fading.”
Their suffering, she said, is like a “race to the bottom.”
DESPITE IT all, Sharone still shares her father’s vision for peace in the region. A Left-wing activist and passionate advocate for human rights, who speaks Arabic, Lifshitz wasn’t afraid to speak out against the government and the “occupation.”
He also counted Palestinians among his friends, many of whom he regularly transported from Gaza to receive medical treatment in hospitals across Israel.
Even so, he wasn’t naive and was fully aware that Hamas was more than capable of causing untold suffering, death, and destruction in the region. “My father had friends in Gaza and the West Bank, and he knew many Palestinian people. He knew what Hamas was,” she said.
He was also aware of the tunnels under Gaza, an unwelcome development that worried him tremendously. “My father was afraid of the tunnels,” she confided.
Some years ago, Lifshitz shared his troubling, yet clear-sighted vision in an article in Haaretz, something which she’s thought about long and hard since he was taken hostage: “When the Palestinians have nothing to lose, we will lose, big time,” he wrote. “The question is, what do we do then?”
Even though he feared what might happen, Lifshitz always believed that the army would be there to protect him, his family, his kibbutz, and his country whenever the need arose. “He never thought the IDF wouldn’t be there,” Sharone said sadly.
Nevertheless, like her father, she firmly believes that a “peaceful solution” is the best way forward.
“Hamas is responsible for the war, but the amount of suffering serves no one,” she stated. “The objectives can’t be reached, so why are we still there?”
Having lived in London for most of her adult life, where she resides with her husband and their son, the last nine months have been particularly difficult for Sharone. Torn between “here” and “there,” she’s been traveling back and forth with some frequency. While she finds it “hard to be away from my son,” she’s learned to “accept certain things,” she said.
The significant rise in antisemitism, particularly in academic circles since the war began, has also proven to be a challenge for Sharone, who is a senior lecturer at the University of East London. On a personal level, work has been “very sympathetic,” she confirmed.
Getting back to her father: “It’s hard to think about someone you love suffering so much,” she lamented, adding that “in some ways, it would be a blessing if he no longer had to experience such distress.”
Which brought us to a final question.
“Do you think you will ever see your father alive again?”
“No,” she replied. “Not if Israel’s prime minister continues to sabotage the deal.”■