Tag: israel

Watching the Hamas video from October 7, 2023

Posted on by Keith Dvorchik

As a passionate Zionist who has been to Israel 20 times, October 7, 2023 impacted me greatly.  I have family and friends that live in Israel, some who live in the south.  Luckily, none of my friends who live in the south were attacked by the terrorists although family of friends were at K’far Aza, and I have since met somebody from Moshav Ein Habasor who was there on October 7th.  An Israeli friend from one of my Momentum trips lost his son on October 7th.  Another friend’s cousin and her 13-year-old daughter were hostages taken by Hamas into Gaza (both have since been released, although at separate times).  I have friends who are now on the front lines in Gaza and in the north.  I have friends whose children are currently serving in the IDF and fighting the war with Hamas.  I am in daily contact with friends and family in Israel, checking in on them and making sure they are ok.  Israel and October 7th is very personal for me.  So, when I heard that the Israel Consulate in Florida was hosting briefings and showing the 47-minute video of the Hamas atrocities around the State of Florida, I knew we had to do it in Central Florida.  I reached out to the consulate, and we scheduled it for Thursday December 14, 2023 at 9 am.

Our target was legislators, media, law enforcement, University Presidents, local Rabbis, and targeted community members.  Our local state representatives showed up, law enforcement showed, and the targeted community members showed.  We had some media but no University Presidents.  The nearly 40 people in attendance were a good cross section of our targeted audience.

I was apprehensive about watching the video.  I had read plenty about it and knew it was going to be awful.  A true representation of people’s inhumanity to people.  I also knew that for me, I had an obligation to bear witness to what Hamas terrorists did and owed it to the victims to watch.  As the video started, the room was eerily silent.  This silence continued through the entire video.

I don’t want to get into the details of the entire video.  Others have done that.  For me, there were a few things that struck me deep and will remain with me forever. 

I want to warn you that these are graphic descriptions.

The Hamas terrorist calling his parents to brag about having killed “10” or “at least 10” Jews.  The excitement in his voice was bone chilling.  Yet, for me, what was worse was listening to his mother’s response.  “Kill, Kill, Kill” is what she told him.  This was a recording made by Hamas to document the excitement of murdering Jews.

The Hamas terrorist, reporting to his superior, about the Jews that he had decapitated.  He brags about cutting off their heads and shooting them in the head.  And the Hamas supervisor telling him to bring the heads back to Gaza so they could ‘play with them’.  Another recording made by Hamas.

The dog at a Kibbutz – you see him in the distance barking and running towards the terrorists.  You know what is going to happen before it does.  And then it does – the terrorist shoots the dog three times, killing it. 

A father and his two sons racing through their house in their underwear to get to the safe room ahead of the terrorists.  They get there but the Hamas terrorists throw a grenade into the room before they can shut the door.  The father jumps on the grenade to save his sons, sacrificing himself in the process.  The children are taken by Hamas back to the kitchen where the Hamas terrorist opens the fridge, takes a drink, then grabs a bottle of Diet Coke and starts drinking it.  The boys are distraught.  One has lost the vision in one eye and as you look closely you can see it is clearly damaged.  They cry for their father who they know is dead.  And they wail, “why am I still alive?”.  They end up being left alone and run away.  Their sadness and cries are something I will never forget.

A dead Israeli lies on the floor while a Hamas terrorist take a hoe and tries to decapitate him.  His body bounces with each blow towards his neck.  The terrorist gives up as it’s not happening easily.  The hoe hitting his head and neck and his body bouncing is something I will always remember.

Watching a Hamas video as the terrorist takes a knife to the neck of a dead IDF soldier and begins to carve away, finally removing the soldier’s head from his body.  You see him slice through the neck.  You see the graphic detail of a beheading.  Then, holding it by the top of his helmet, he walks out of the room, leaving the headless body lying on the floor.

Hamas terrorists bringing dead Israeli bodies back to Gaza.  The Gazan people in the streets celebrating as the bodies are rolled into the street.  The people of Gaza kicking and punching the dead bodies of Israelis, spitting on them.  The cheers and joy in their faces as they assault the dead bodies of Israeli citizens.  The pure hatred coming from the people of Gaza, the ‘innocent civilians’, as they celebrate the murder of Israeli citizens. 

The Hamas terrorists capture a room full of women.  The video cuts to the women being led out of the room, clearly after a period of time.  As you watch their reactions, you can tell that they were abused.  Some can’t look up.  Some have blood on their pants in the crotch and their backside.  We were later told by the consulate that there are graphic rape scenes that out of respect for the women, are not shown or included in the video.  Hearing that made watching these women even more painful.

IDF soldiers going into a home in a Kibbutz.  As they enter, the floor is covered in blood.  The walls are splattered with blood.  The deeper they go into the house, the more blood that is on the floor.  It’s literally a red floor painted with blood.  Huge pools in some places.  The brutality that must have occurred for that much blood to be in the entire house.

A number of houses where the bodies were burned beyond recognition, some mainly being ash.  Some decapitated and then burned.  Some barely recognizable as human.  And the sheer number of them that were burned alive. 

The desperation in the voices of the responders to the music festival massacre as they arrive and try to see if anybody is alive there.  As they walk through, they call ‘is anybody there’ and get no reply.  They begin by counting the number of dead people and reporting it but they stop quickly as there simply are too many dead bodies.  “Everybody on the stage is dead” they report. “Everybody in the concessions is dead” they report.  The camera shows the massive number of dead bodies that were massacred by the Hamas terrorists while they were at a music festival.  I had seen the video before but never heard the desperation in the voices of those responding to the massacre. 

The faces of the terrorists after each person they murder.  The smiles.  The joy.  The happiness.  Once proclaims, “This is my first kill!” with such joy and excitement it burned inside me.  I’ll never forget the faces of the terrorists and the joy they had in murdering Jews.  The celebration.  The clear rush of adrenaline they had and their desire to kill more and more and more.  I don’t like to hate.  It’s a powerful and negative emotion that only causes harm, however with each of these faces I found myself hating them, wanting them to be hunted down like the animals they showed themselves to be.  It’s not who I am yet it is who they are.

The video was 47 minutes long and there were 35-40 people in the room.  It was completely silent for the entire 47 minutes.  Watching the footage was difficult and painful.  It tore at my insides.  I found myself clenching my teeth throughout much of it as the anger and sadness and pain overwhelmed me. 

I’m still processing what I watched.  I’m still processing the horrors of the Hamas terrorists.  I know there is a sadness and hole inside me because of October 7th that after seeing it is bigger than it was before.  The urge to do something and make a difference is far greater than it was just 12 hours ago. 

Hamas is evil.  And we must fight evil with everything that we have.  If we allow evil to live, it only grows, it never dies of its own accord.  War is terrible and nobody wants it, however Hamas must be eliminated.  The evil that was done on October 7th is just the beginning if we don’t stop it now.  The leadership of Hamas have told us this directly.  Watching this video showed just how evil they are and that we need to believe them when they say they will do what they did on October 7th over and over and over and over again.  And that they will bring it to Europe, America, and Canada. 

The sacrifice of the father, the faces and cries of his sons, the faces of the women captured by Hamas, and the joy on the faces of these evil men will never leave me. 

Am Yisrael Chai

Ein Habesor and the impact of October 7

Posted on by Keith Dvorchik

Thursday morning, I went to an early breakfast with people from City Serve, an organization that is doing great work in Israel.  They are particularly focused on Ein Habesor, a Moshav near the Gaza border.  On October 7, 2023, the terrorists of Hamas attacked Ein Habesor and thanks to the bravery of some members of the Moshav, there were no casualties and no hostages taken from the Moshav.  However, nearly 60% of Israel’s produce comes from the area and the Thai workers returning to Thailand, many other workers being recalled to serve in the IDF during the war, and the members of the Moshav being relocated to the Dead Sea for safety, there aren’t enough workers to harvest the fields.  City Serve is working to help with getting the fields harvested and raising money to help take care of the needs of the members of the Moshav while they are living in hotel rooms at the Dead Sea.  These are all worthy and important causes, however that isn’t what I found most impactful from the conversation.

One of the people at breakfast was Dr. Yftach Gepner who lives on the Ein Habesor moshav.  On the morning of October 7, his brother, with one M-16, defended the moshav from the terrorists, getting the gates closed and keeping them from getting inside to murder, rape, and kidnap the Israelis who live and work there.  In the process of defending the moshav, he was shot in the shoulder and the bullet remained inside him.  As a physician, Dr Gepner knew he needed to get him to a hospital as the bullet could have gone anywhere and could have damaged internal organs.  You may have heard and read about the rest of the story.  Dr Gepner put his brother in the passenger seat of their Tesla, laid it flat, and began racing on back roads to get his brother to the hospital, which normally is 20 minutes away.  His Tesla was attacked by the terrorists and shot more than 100 times, yet he was able to keep driving, sometimes in reverse to get away from them.  It took him two hours to get to the hospital while escaping the hostages.  During the escape, his brother was shot again in the hip, breaking it.  He needed surgery and this hospital couldn’t provide it so Dr Gepner hot-wired an ambulance and stole it, giving his brother an IV to ensure his survival during the drive.  Not only did his brother get the surgery he needed, but merely weeks later he was back on the moshav, patrolling the grounds to keep it safe.  The story was inspiring on so many levels and made me want to go to Israel to volunteer even more – helping pick vegetables, cooking meals, or cleaning – doing anything that is needed from a 50+ year old.

Another of the people at the breakfast flew to Israel immediately after October 7 and was taken to Kibbutz Nir Oz.  As he spoke, his voice increased in volume, and you could feel his pain.  He shared that he had to step over dead bodies and personally saw decapitated babies, babies with limbs cut off, and true heinous crimes.  My heart broke listening to his personal experience of the horror of this Hamas attack.

City Serve is raising money to help the people of Ein Habesor.  If you are moved to give, 100% of your gift will go to the people, and there is a $150,000 match so every dollar becomes two.  You can give by clicking here.

In America, we often like to think that everybody is like us.  That everybody has the same values and morals that we do.  That it is common and normal to value human life and that we do anything to protect and safe it.  It is one of our most endearing qualities and one of our most dangerous, and many other cultures do NOT hold the same values and morals.  Their behavior shows us who they are and too often we refuse to believe them.  Hamas has shown true evil.  They have shown who they are and what they believe and value.  They do not value human life, shown through the use of human shields and turning schools, hospitals, private homes, and mosques into military bases.  They have shown they don’t value human life through the attacks on October 7th when they murdered, raped, kidnapped, and decapitated innocent civilians.  There is no moral equivalency and there is nothing to do but to eliminate them. 

Yesterday, listening to Dr Gepner describe October 7 at Ein Habesor and hearing the other person speak about what they saw at Nir Oz, was powerful and painful.  As a proud Zionist and Jew, it strengthened my resolve to continue advocating for Israel and to embrace and express Judaism.  October 7 was a wakeup call not just to Israel but to all Jews around the world.  Hiding doesn’t get us anywhere.  Rallying as a community, like they have done in Israel, is the answer.