They are waiting for their relatives who are hostages of Hamas to return. They hope to see them come back and smile. One such case is Eitan Gonen who sits in his daughter Romy’s bedroom looking at her photos.
She is praying that the 23-year-old will be among those who return when Israel’s temporary truce with Hamas takes effect and some of the hostages.
Gonen lifts his head and tries to hold back his tears.
On a shelf behind him are photo frames, a nail polish and a collection of cosmetics, left behind by 23-year-old Romi when she left her home in northern Israel to go to a rave party in the south where the massacre by Palestinian gunmen took place her Hamas on October 7.
“It was very, very difficult for me to enter Romi’s room for 47 days. And now we are in this room and the emotions are very, very strong,” her father said, as reported by the Athens News Agency, citing Reuters. “But we are optimistic that Romi will come back home. We are confident that Romi will return home alive,” he added.
In his hand he holds a photograph in which he is seen at a younger age holding his daughter, who was a baby at the time.
The last time they spoke, on the morning of October 7, Romi was running for her life with her best friend, Gaya. The girls hid in the bushes and prayed to be saved, while Hamas gunmen stormed the party they had attended. All the time, Romi was on the phone with her family.
After hiding for hours and with the gunmen closing in on them, the two girls managed to alert a colleague, Ben, who was also at the party. He took them in his car and they tried to escape, Gonen said.
“They murdered Ben and Gaia who were sitting in the front seat. And this online, at that time. We heard the shots,” he said. “Romi was hit in the hand by a bullet. He was screaming. He was afraid. She simply told her mother: “I’m going to die, today.”
The last thing they heard, Gonen said, was the attackers saying in Arabic, “She’s alive, let’s get her.” Her phone was later traced to the Gaza Strip.
The Hamas attack, which Israel says killed 1,200 people, sparked the war in Gaza that has been raging for almost seven weeks. Israel says its mission is to eliminate Hamas and bring back some 240 hostages held in Gaza.
Since then, more than 14,000 people have been killed in Israel’s shelling and ground offensive, according to health authorities in the Hamas-controlled territory.
Brokered by Qatar, Israel and Hamas agreed to a temporary ceasefire during which some hostages to Gaza will be repatriated in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons. The process is delayed until at least tomorrow, Friday.
However, it remains unclear which hostages will be released. Officials have said attention is being paid to the dozens of children and women.
“We have confidence in the Israel Defense Forces and the government of Israel that they will do everything they can to bring Romi back, and all the other abductees,” Gonen said, adding, “I miss her voice, her hugs. I miss the intense energy she brings to every space.”
Source: News Beast
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