‘My brothers were captured – that was the good news’

In a text message sent from the saferoom on kibbutz Nir Oz, Yair Horn (45) confirmed that he and younger brother Eitan (37) were together. Amos Horn (42) never heard from either of them again. It’s been 313 days since then.

“For the first month, no one contacted us. We knew nothing. The army, the police, and the government couldn’t tell us anything. Both my siblings just disappeared,” says Amos.

His fight to bring his brothers home brought him to The Base in Glenhazel on Monday, 12 August, where he was guest speaker of its Tisha B’Av programme, a poignant present-day commemoration of the saddest day in Jewish history.

During Amos’s choked-up account, in which he described his lonely fight for the freedom of his brothers held hostage in Gaza, the auditorium was filled with the heartbroken silence of a community in support. It included Chief Rabbi Dr Warren Goldstein, as well as government representatives from the United States, Israel, Germany and Argentina.

The family heard nothing until 25 November. It was seven weeks of brutal silence. When the first hostage deal took place, releasing 105 Israelis in a prisoner-exchange deal, Sapir Cohen and Lena Tupenov were among them.

“The two women, also taken hostage from Kibbutz Nir Oz, informed us that my brothers were both alive and in Gaza,” says Amos.

“After they told me, I felt I could breathe normally again for the first time,” he says. “But when you hear that your brothers are being held hostage by Hamas terrorists, and that’s the good news, you realise just how insane the situation is.”

Amos, his wife, and two children, took the opportunity to come to South Africa as part of a joint initiative between the South African Jewish National Fund (JNF SA) and The Base in its ongoing campaign to support hostage families and help raise awareness for their safe return.

Says JNF SA Chairperson Michael Kransdorff, “The warm Zionist embrace of our South African community offers families a safe reprieve from the overwhelming trauma of their uncertain circumstances.”

Before 7 October, all three brothers were living their Zionist dreams. They had all made aliya from Argentina, completed army service, and were living happy, simple lives in Israel.

Eldest brother Yair was a stalwart member of his once thriving kibbutz community, where one in four residents was either murdered or abducted in the devastating attack. Eitan lived in Kfar Saba, and was uplifted daily by the laughter of the children he taught as an informal educator in Jewish youth movements, which also took him all over the world.

“That morning, after getting no response from my brothers, I called all my friends on the kibbutz to find out what was happening, not realising they were all busy fighting for their lives. I wanted to drive there with my baseball bat to help get my brothers out, but my wife told me not to go.”

Since that fateful day, the family are doing everything they can to secure the brothers’release.

“We go to the Knesset every day. We’ve been in contact with the president of Argentina, the king of Spain, the United Nations, and the Red Cross. We’re still waiting to hear back from the Red Cross, but many congressmen and women are showing their commitment. After hearing our personal story, they are joining our fight to bring them home.”

Amos believes “the only way to bring them back home is to make another deal. Killing Hamas leaders doesn’t help because you cannot kill Hamas ideology. I know it’s not normal to negotiate with terrorists, but it’s the only way. Bibi [President Benjamin Netanyahu] must make another deal.

“Because this isn’t just my story or the story of my brothers, it’s our story, the story of our people,” he says, wiping away his tears through his broken-English, while his son Ariel (9) looks on.

Rabbi Aharon Zulberg of The Base reassured Amos of the community’s ongoing support, saying, “Your pain is our pain, your fight is our fight, we’re all responsible for each other, and we are all in this together.”

The auditorium in Glenhazel is full of #BringThemHome posters – 150 faces helplessly frozen in time. They all have their own story, their own family, their own life. We must continue to fight for them.