Gadi Moses helped build Kibbutz Nir Oz with his bare hands. A passionate agronomist and farmer, he used the knowledge he found studying the ground and how to make things grow to help foreign countries grow crops. Gadi adored explaining the fine details of agriculture to people coming to the Israeli kibbutz for instruction. In his retirement, he built a communal garden there. A lover of fine wines, he grew grapes as a hobby. He loved nothing more than nature and his family, his three children and his grandchildren.
On October 7, 2023, Moses witnessed the destruction of his beautiful home. His partner, Ephrat Katz, was killed that day. He was taken into Gaza, far away from verdant fields and communal gardens. It seemed unlikely that this then 79-year-old man would make it out alive, especially since another hostage captured with him by Islamic Jihad, Elad Katzir, was killed. But this Thursday, there he was, smiling warmly among a throng of Gazans, knowing that he was finally on his way home. It was a smile he kept shinning all day, one that reached deep into his eyes and shone ever so bright.
While waiting to reunite with his children, Moses told the cameras, “I vow to help rehabilitate Kibbutz Nir Oz.” Then his three children rushed in, yelling for their father like they were little kids and not grown adults with their own children, crying and hugging. “Abba, abba, our abba,” his daughter Moran cried as his sons Yair and Oded joined in their tearful hug. Moses’s son, Yair, sported a big bushy beard, which he promised not to shave until he was reunited with his dad — which he can finally be rid of now.
In the news, Moses’s first wife and the mother of their children, Margalit Moses, spoke of her relief. Gadi told his children that he heard her talking about him on the radio while he was being held hostage. Margalit was also captured from Nir Oz that day and released in the first hostage deal back in November 2023, as were Gadi’s partner Ephrat’s daughter and two granddaughters, one of whom, Doron Katz-Asher, is currently pregnant with a third daughter. Now, Moses will get to welcome the new baby along with the rest of the family. One of his 10 grandchildren refused to hold his bar mitzvah until his grandfather returned. Maybe they will also get to celebrate that big 80th birthday they all missed.
“My brother, what a smile,” said his sibling who greeted Moses at the hospital. His daughter-in-law hugged him through tears. On his 80th birthday, she called “Saba Gadi” their “Peter Pan,” saying, “He may be 80 but in his spirit, he is 40.”
Earlier that day, Moses also reunited with a familiar face from his kibbutz, sweet Arbel Yehoud, 29, who was also captured by Islamic Jihad and is believed to have been held with no other Israeli hostages for most of her over 480 days of captivity. Their smiles in that reunification video are infectious and genuine, with Moses squeezing her tight like she’s his own granddaughter. The pictures feel so different from the sights of Yehoud’s scary release among a rowdy crowd in Khan Younes, which the Yehoud family asked not to be aired by the news and that had Israeli authorities fearing for their lives and holding the release of Palestinian prisoners in retaliation.
Yehoud was with her partner, Ariel Cunio, on October 7, along with a puppy they adopted a few days before the attack. The dog was killed during the violence, and both Ariel and Arbel were taken into Gaza. So was Ariel’s brother, David, his wife Sharon and two children, twins Emma and Yuli. Sharon and the twins were released in November along with Sharon’s sister Danielle and her daughter Emilia. Sharon and her two daughters are still fighting for the return of the man she’s loved for over 11 years, and who, along with his brother, is not currently on the list of 33 hostages to be released during this ceasefire agreement.
The Cunio, Moses and the Yehoud families are Nir Oz veterans. Ariel and Arbel grew up together on the kibbutz and the two kindled their romance six years ago, when she returned to the kibbutz her grandparents helped found after some time away. Aside from Arbel, with whom she loved to travel, she loved her nieces, nephews and the stars; she worked at the local center for educational technology and organized stargazing events. For over a year, Arbel couldn’t look at the stars. She also missed the birth of her youngest niece, Dor, who was born days after October 7.
On October 7, Arbel’s parents were in their home in Rishon LeTzion, which they had left the kibbutz for, but her two brothers were there that day. Her older brother, Dolev, a trained paramedic, went out to help during the carnage, leaving behind his pregnant wife Sigal and his three small children in the shelter. The four of them survived. Dolev was believed to have been taken into Gaza until June of 2024, when his body was identified as one of those recovered from the fields outside the kibbutz. Arbel’s other brother Netta held his shelter door as gunshots fired outside, and managed to keep himself and his wife and child safe. “Since I left the shelter, I’ve been looking for my siblings,” he said after the attack. Now he gets to hold Arbel again, and grieve Dolev, before their family continues the fight for Ariel and David and the fellow kibbutz members still being held in Gaza.
Six more people left Gaza after over a year this Thursday. Five Thai nationals, all agricultural workers — Pongsak Thaenna, Sathian Suwannakham, Watchara Sriaoun, Bannawat Seathao and Surasak Lamnao — whose families watched with joy and exultation as they crossed the border and started their journeys back home.
Lastly, there was Agam Berger, the final female soldier left in Hamas captivity. Last week, the four other women who were captured from the Nir Oz base were released without her. Liri Albag refused to let go of Agam’s hand as they were dragged towards the rally where they were released. She stood in place, saying she wanted to stay with Agam. Unfortunately, they had to part, but not for long. Five days later, they got to hug again.
And Berger’s parents got to see their precious daughter again. They ran towards her and held her tight as she cried, pale and heartbroken. “It’s going to be OK,” they both told her, over and over. “We are here and we are never leaving you, a mother’s promise, a mother’s promise,” her mother, Meirav, said as her father, Shlomi, stared at his child in awe.
“Through ways of faith I chose and through faith I have returned, thank you to all the people of Israel and the heroic IDF soldiers, you are the best in the world,” Berger, who loves playing the violin, shared in a message from the helicopter which flew her to the Bellison medical center, where the four other soldiers opted to remain for another week to make sure she didn’t have to start her healing journey alone. Emily Damari, brought home in the first round of hostage releases, shared a video of the chopper flying through the skies. “My sister!” she joyfully exclaimed. The four girls and the rest of Berger’s family were watching from the hospital, singing, clapping and dancing at the sight of the aircraft.
After she met her parents, Berger got to reunite with her siblings: her twin sister, her younger sister and younger brother. “You’re as tall as dad,” she told her youngest sibling, whose bar mitzvah she missed while in captivity, through tears and kissed their heads lovingly.
Liri Albag, Karina Ariev, Daniella Gilboa and Naama Levy were all waiting for her around the corner, having spent the morning making welcome back signs for their friend. Their reunion was as moving as can be.
Soon, Agam Berger will be reunited with her violin. Arbel Yehoud will get to hold her youngest niece. Gadi Moses will get to visit the ashened fields of Nir Oz and dream up of ways to make them green again. Yet there is one thing they, and their families, all agree on — their journey will not be done until all the remaining hostages are back home in Israel, free and safe, getting to gaze together at the open sky and Yehoud’s beloved stars.
