When Yona Schnitzer, a Marketing writer of Tel Aviv, participated in the traditional meal of Seder Pasqua, said a special prayer for the return of all the hostages still held by Palestinian militants in Gaza.
He had thought that their freedom would be assured by Easter of 2025, but this did not happen.
“It has become so normalized that there are hostages in Gaza,” said Schnitzer, 36 years old. “It’s surreal and heartbreaking.”
On Saturday evening, the Israelis observed the beginning of the Jewish Easter, the Jewish Festival of Liberty, for the second time since 7 October 2023 led by Hamas, he turned on the war in Gaza. The holiday is usually a celebration of the biblical history of the ancient Israelites freed from slavery in Egypt, with families gathering to tell that story, sing songs and eat special foods.
But for many Israelis, the continuous captivity of the hostages has difficulty feeling the joy of the holiday.
“We will score the holidays. We will not be celebrated,” said Orly Gavishi-Sotto, 47 years old, a college administrator from the north of Israel. “We can only celebrate when all the hostages are at home.”
Mrs. Gavishi-Sotto said that her family would put an empty chair at the Seder table, symbolizing the hostages of Gaza who could not be with their families.
The Israeli government claimed to believe that 24 of the 59 hostages remained still alive.
Saturday evening, while the Israelis gathered with their families to mark Easter, Hamas published a new video showing one of those hostages, Idan Alexander. In a declaration distributed by a group of hostages, Alexander’s family asked the media not to circulate the movie.
In January, the Israeli and Hamas negotiators agreed on a ceased the fire that should have led to freedom for the rest of the hostages. Thirty living hostages and the bodies of eight other were returned during the initial six weeks of the agreement, but Israel resumed the attacks in Gaza on March 18 after the two sides were unable to agree on an extension of the truce.
About 1,200 people were killed in Israel in the attack of October 2023, according to the government. More than 50,000 people in Gaza have been killed since the beginning of the war, according to the Ministry of Health of the Territory, which does not distinguish between civilians and fighters in contents of victims. Since the ceased the fire collapsed, over 1,500 people in Gaza have been killed, says the ministry.
Dani Miran, 80 years old, whose son Omri Miran is a hostage to Gaza, he said he was planning a simple siter with his family and trying to reassure his grandchildren that their father would return home.
Omri Miran, now 48 years old, was taken by the Palestinian militants on October 7, 2023, by Kibbutz Nahal Oz near the Israeli border with Gaza. Him; His wife, Lishay Miran-Lavi; And their two daughters, Roni and Alma, were initially kept under shooting, according to family members, but only he was forced to Gaza.
“Omri has been in the tunnels for over a year and a half,” said Miran. “I don’t know what his mental state is. I can only hope that he is strong enough to bear this tragedy.”
The forum of hostage families, a group that represents the relatives of many prisoners, invited the Israelis to keep headquarters in an outdoor square in Tel Aviv who has become known as “square hostages”. The group described Jewish Easter this year as “another festival of freedom without true freedom”.
Today Arbel, 77 years old, residing in Kibbutz Yiftah in the north of Israel, said that his family would use a hostage -themed haggadah, the text read during the Seder, which tells the story of the liberation of the Israelites.
“A key principle of Judaism and Israeli identity is the redemption of prisoners,” he said.
Over 68 % of Israelis say they believe that freedom of obstacle is more important than to remove Hamas from power, according to a survey published by the Israeli Institute of Democracy Thursday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said that the war will end until the military government of Hamas and the Gaza government are dismantled. Hamas said that he will not free all the hostages unless Israel permanently permanently terms.
Arbel, who is critical of the government, said that while reflecting on the difficult situation of the hostages in this Easter, he was also thinking about the suffering of Palestinian civilians in Gaza and the West Bank.
“I’m thinking about the difficulties of both peoples,” he said.