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Esther Sperber

Hostages NOW: The infinite value of life even during war

The horrors of battle, the numbers, shifting focus to the north - too many factors chip away at our sense of urgency to bring our captives home from Gaza
Vigil in New York after the six hostages were murdered. (Liri Agami and Dani Tenenbaum)
Vigil in New York after the six hostages were murdered. (Liri Agami and Dani Tenenbaum)

After a year of war on multiple fronts, Yahya Sinwar, the brutal leader of Hamas, was killed by IDF soldiers last week. Perhaps this is a sort of victory, and a measure of justice, but war, even when necessary, takes a toll. The most horrible price is lives lost, followed by injuries, trauma, and destroyed homes. Israeli doctors documented a 20 percent increase in tooth and gum problems, attributed to stress. The devastation and death in Gaza and Lebanon are unfathomable and immeasurably greater.

But we are at a risk of another deficit, an erosion of morality and empathy. On TV, I see bombed buildings, chunks of concrete hanging precariously from mangled rebar. I see photos of funerals and weeping mothers. With so much sorrow and destruction one might forget that every life — Israeli and Palestinian — is infinitely valuable and that all humans are created in the image of God. 

I have been among the leaders of the Hostages Families Forum in New York, which has  organized hundreds of events including vigils, rallies, runs, lectures and prayer services to call to “Seal the Deal” and “Bring Them Home.” We reiterate that military operations have rescued eight hostages alive, while over 105 were returned in a negotiated temporary ceasefire deal in November 2023 (and four others before that). 

As military focuses on the North, concern for the 101 hostages in the dungeons of the Gaza tunnels becomes even more urgent and acute. The IDF recently announced that Hamas is no longer be a military organization under one central command. Rather, with diminished communications and a fractured chain of leadership, platoons are operating independently. While this might be military success,  it is devastating for the hostages. With no one in charge, negotiations become impossible. I am terrified that the hostages might be killed, or disappear, like Avera Mengistu, a mentally unstable Ethiopian-born Israeli who crossed into Gaza in 2014 and has not been seen since.

I hear people question the demand for a deal to return the hostages. They worry it will impede the war, or that the price Hamas will demand is too high. “What if Israel releases the next Sinwar?” In Israel, families of the hostages have been attacked violently for begging to see their loved ones.

Negotiations are hard. Those who care, or have more to lose, are at a disadvantage. But the infinite value of a human life is at the foundation of our morality; losing that commitment could destabilize the entire structure. 

One of the horrors of war is the cheapening of human life. It is hard to cry for hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of people. Meir Baruchin, a high school social studies teacher in Israel, posts pictures of children and teens killed in Gaza. I dread seeing these Facebook posts, but I feel an obligation to witness them. With no words to express my feelings, I add a crying emoji. If, as the Talmud teaches, every human is an entire world, then such losses are not meant to be ignored. We read the names of each of the 101 hostages and chant, “Now,” on runs for the hostages every Sunday in Central Park.  

I recently came across grainy film footage from the Yom Kippur War. A dusty, bright-eyed Israeli soldier spoke about his certainty that the IDF would do anything to return injured or captive soldiers. This ethos is uniquely, and perhaps irrationally, Israeli, but the trust it creates fosters unquantifiable camaraderie and bravery. After the failure of October 7th, returning the hostages is imperative to restoring faith in the Israeli collective commitment to the sanctity of the individual.

Alongside the moral and Israeli commitment, we also have a unique Jewish tradition of redeeming captives. Maimonides, the great medieval physician and rabbinic giant, wrote that “there is no bigger mitzvah than redeeming captives.” Similarly, in 1977, when an Air France flight was hijacked by terrorists, a group of venerated rabbis including the Sephardic chief rabbi, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, issued a ruling that was handed to then-prime minister Yitzhak Rabin:

Although it is clear that releasing terrorists carries with it grave dangers, nonetheless, being that the Jewish hostages are found in a state of immediate danger, according to Jewish law they therefore override the danger of releasing the terrorists and therefore it is obligatory for the government of Israel to enter negotiations with the terrorists and do everything they can to save the captives from the danger that hovers over their lives.

When weighing future threats that would be a result of releasing terrorists in a negotiation against the immediate, confirmed danger that the hostages faced, the rabbis wrote that we are commanded to prioritize the release of those in immediate danger, even at high cost. 

It has been over a year since 101 hostages — men, women, children and babies — were taken to Gaza, and it is urgent to negotiate a deal that will bring them home and end this horrific war. This is a moral, Israeli, and Jewish imperative, and we are running out of time to do it.

About the Author
Esther Sperber is an architect, founder of Studio ST Architects. Born and raised in Israel, she has been living in New York for 25 years. She writes and lectures about architecture, culture, religion and psychoanalysis. Her work has been published in the New York Times, The Huffington Post, Lilith, the Jewish Week, TOI the Forward as well as many academic journals. She is one of the leaders of Hostages' Family Forum in NY and the pro democracy protests.
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