Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Elie Wiesel is credited with saying:
When a person dies once, it is a tragedy; when a person dies a thousand times, it becomes a statistic.
His point was that there’s something in us that just can’t grasp large-scale evil and atrocities. Our brains want to desensitize us to the worst of human nature.
We want to distance ourselves and detach from a reality that is too evil for us to even want to comprehend. So, we instinctively erect a buffer of euphemisms and clinical language, pursuing “objectivity,” conducting “trend analysis,” or studying “behavioral patterns.”
Such was the case last week, when the terrorist organization Hamas released the 20 living Israeli hostages who had survived until President Trump negotiated the first phase of a peace deal between Israel and the terrorist organization. Some of the reporting was detached from the implicit inhumanity of this story.
Here’s some of that ‘objectivity.’ Hamas released the hostages in two groups, not directly to Israel, but to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which served as an intermediary inside Gaza. The Red Cross then brought the hostages to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). The IDF, in turn, delivered them to a military base in Israel, and from there they went to Tel Aviv hospitals.
Does that sound neat and clean enough for you? That’s the talk and tone of international diplomacy. But let’s go back to the spirit of what Elie Wiesel said. Even though 20 is not a large number, even it can be beyond our comprehension when we try to grasp the stories of the hostages. Twenty hostage stories of this nature can just overwhelm us. So, let’s look at one.
At around 6:30 a.m., on October 7, Hamas terrorists broke through the border fence and stormed homes on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, murdering and abducting residents.
One of those adducted was Omri Miran, who is now 48 years old. He’s the father of two young girls. Roni is four. Alma is two. This is how the Jerusalem Post described his abduction on October 7, 2023:
“Omri Miran was abducted in front of his wife and two children by invading terrorists on October 7,2023. Now, after spending two birthdays in captivity, the Hungarian-Israeli kibbutznik is finally set to return home to his wife Lishay and daughters Roni and Alma.
Omri lived on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, working as a shiatsu therapist and a gardener, according to the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.
On October 7, terrorists livestreamed as they dragged Miran and his family from the safe room in their home to a second location, eventually deciding to abduct only Miran to Gaza. While the family had originally locked the door of the room, Hamas held a neighbor at gunpoint and had him beg for Miran to open the door to him, according to KAN (Israel’s public broadcasting organization).”
The terrorists posted a three-hour livestream on Facebook during which they aimed guns at the family. On that day, two-year-old Roni chased the terrorists who were taking her father. She wanted him back.
This is video of him prior to that day.
Omri Miran — a husband, a father of two daughters, Roni and little Alma — has waited 627 days. 🎗️
— Bring Our People 🎗️ (@Bring_Daughters) June 24, 2025
He must come home now.#BringThemHomeNow pic.twitter.com/8XucAXnpW7
Heartbreaking doesn’t begin to describe it, but if there is any silver lining at all in Omri’s story it is that he wasn’t killed and his family was spared.
According to reports, Hamas left Lishay and the girls behind, physically unharmed, most likely for logistical reasons. Hamas wanted to use adult men as hostages to bargain with Israel. While the hostage-taking and murder that day were chaotic, whether one lived or died may have turned on nothing more than a split-second impulse on the part of the invaders. For some random reason Lishay, and her two daughters were not held captive or physically harmed.
Hamas used Omri in its propaganda videos:
"’One of the kidnapped who returned in one of the last exchanges said that he was with Omri in the tunnels and apartments until July. It is not clear why they were separated at that stage. Overall, his condition is fine. Apparently, he is physically fine,’ Miran's brother, Nadav, told Walla (one of Israel’s largest and oldest online news sites) in February,” the Jerusalem Post reported.
We don’t yet know all the details of Omri’s life in captivity or what he had to endure. At the beginning of his confinement, he had no idea whether his wife and kids had been killed. Hamas held him in several locations, including underground tunnels and safe houses. To evade Israeli intelligence, he and the other hostages were continually moved from one location to the next. His brother estimates that he was moved to 23 different locations.
It’s been 81 days since Omri was taken from us by Hamas, 81 days since the nightmare began. We have no idea when it will end, and neither do the Red Cross or UN. Who can help us bring Omri home? Who can save us from our misery? pic.twitter.com/2OHb0Iy025
— Lishay Miran-Lavi (@LishayLM) December 27, 2023
Hamas held him in a cage. The terrorists kept him bound for weeks at a time. They starved him.
For his part, he did that thing you read about or hear about when the subject is how people survive captivity. He kept track of time, which helped his mental acuity.
This was life as he knew it, overshadowed by all of the uncertainty associated with the unrestrained military conflict that ensued after October 7.
Last week, on October 13, Omri reunited with his wife and daughters in a tearful, highly emotional meeting. Little Alma didn’t really know her father, having lived almost her whole life while he was held hostage. Her mother had made his presence known to her through pictures. So, when she “met” her father upon his release, she called him “Daddy Omri.”
Within days of his return, Omri wasted no time in trying to get back to living and loving, starting with a trip to the beach.
Omri Miran, a survivor of captivity, spends time at sea with his family.💛
— Eli Afriat 🇮🇱🎗 (@EliAfriatISR) October 17, 2025
How good it feels to see them like this. pic.twitter.com/uHe3YnoWom
Omri is not a statistic. And neither are the other hostages who survived the ordeal and those who were killed. You can learn more about them from the Jerusalem Post.
The stories of October 7 involve many tales of tragedy, courage, evil, good, and, in the end, as in the case of Omri Miran, faith.
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