“I have to be his voice so he will be heard,” she tells JNS.
By Amelie Botbol, JNS
“My son is down there, screaming and crying, asking for someone to get him out and nobody hears him. I have to be his voice so he will be heard. I have no choice in the matter,” Idit Ohel, the mother of Hamas captive Alon Ohel told JNS on Sunday.
“Alon is coming home alive. I will say it a thousand times. Alon is coming home alive and I just have to make sure of it. I have to do everything to make sure he comes back as soon as possible,” she said.
Alon, a passionate musician and a pianist, is the eldest of three. He was kidnapped at the age of 22 and turned 24 in captivity on Feb. 10. Alon returned from traveling throughout Asia a month before his abduction.
Alon left en route to the Supernova Music Festival on the morning of Oct. 7, 2023. When Hamas began firing rockets at southern Israel, Alon and his friends got into their car and drove away from the site to the nearest roadside shelter near Kibbutz Re’im. It was the same shelter in which Hersh Goldberg-Polin and Aner Shapira sought refuge.
Of the 27 people who took cover in bomb shelters, four were kidnapped and only seven survived Hamas’s hand grenades and machine gunfire, hiding under the remains of other revelers. Two of Alon’s friends were murdered and two survived.
“One of Alon’s friends that was with him in the bomb shelter told the police about it. My husband went to Soroka hospital because the person who rescued the seven took Alon’s phone and brought it to Soroka,” Ohel said. “Later that night, we got information that Alon was kidnapped. We only got the official notice two weeks later.”
More details have emerged about Alon’s physical and mental condition from former Hamas captives Eli Sharabi, Or Levy and Eliya Cohen who were held with him and are part of a group of 25 hostages and eight deceased released in the first phase of a Jan. 19 ceasefire which has since ended. They revealed that Alon had been injured by shrapnel and couldn’t see with his right eye.
“We know that when they got to Gaza, Hamas stitched some of the holes in Alon’s body, leaving the shrapnel inside, and they did it without any anesthesia,” Ohel said.
“Alon has been held in the worst conditions in Gaza to this day. He’s been beaten and in shackles, chains in his legs, he can’t move much. He is being starved. He sleeps on the floor and does not know the difference between night and day. His captors don’t turn off the light because they want to torture him,” she said.
“Alon’s injury is life-threatening and he needs to get medical attention. The injured need to get medical attention and it has not happened yet. The ICRC [International Committee of the Red Cross] has never seen Alon or any other hostages. It’s against international law and it is not right,” she added.
Due to a lack of intelligence information about his condition, his mother said, Alon wasn’t released in the first phase of the ceasefire, which included only “humanitarian cases.”
“I knew that he was taken alive because there is footage of it. I didn’t know what conditions he was held in. Nobody knew. When he was kidnapped, you could see blood all over him, but the IDF never thought of the fact that he suffered that kind of injury. I don’t know why,” his mother said.
To raise awareness of Alon’s plight, 34 pianos were placed all over Israel, including at Hostage Square in Tel Aviv, and an additional 20 across the world with a sign reading, “Alon, you are not alone.”
TheYellowPiano, a project by the family of Alon Ohel, in London. Credit: Courtesy of JW3/X.
Alon is a gifted pianist. “The pianos are a beacon of light because it’s about giving to others. It’s a very strong statement about unity and bringing people together for one reason only, for helping the hostages come home,” Ohel said.
“When you play for somebody, you give them something from yourself and you are sending all this love to them. Music is an international language, it brings people together and when people hear piano playing in public space, they come to hear it,” she explained.
Ohel described Alon, who is believed to be held alone 40 meters under the ground, as “a fighter.”
“He has been holding on, thinking about the future, playing music on his body ,just trying to survive, My son is very strong. He is fighting for his life but he needs us to bring him home. He needs a deal to happen so he can come home,” she said.
“We all thought the Jan. 19 ceasefire was a sealed deal with phases but Phase 2 is not happening and for me Phase 1 hasn’t ended because Alon is injured. They have to do something about that,” she said.
In captivity, Alon is believed to be whistling Asaf Amdursky’s version of the song “Shir Lelo Shem” (Song Without a Name) to keep his spirits high.
Since Oct. 7, Ohel and her husband never went back to work, advocating full time for the release of their son in Israel and abroad.
“We don’t live in Tel Aviv. We live in the north, in Lavon, near Carmiel, and we drive back and forth. My 15-year-old daughter still lives in the north, she needs us there. It’s a five-and-a-half-hour day of just commuting. It’s very hard,” she said.
Speaking to JNS ahead of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington D.C., Ohel said she hoped whatever Netanyahu and Trump decided would help bring all the remaining 59 hostages home, 24 of whom are believed to be alive.
“We need Trump, we need his help. We need to make sure he does not forget any of the hostages and does everything in his power to bring them home. I know he can do it, I know he has the power. I think it’s not a one-person job. There are many people we need at this time, especially Trump and Netanyahu,” she said.
Trump told the press during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House on Monday, “We are trying very hard to get the hostages out.”
“We’re looking at another ceasefire. We’ll see what happens. But we … want to get the hostages out. Israeli people want the hostages out more than anything,” Trump said, adding that Netanyahu was working “very hard” toward that goal.
Hamas last week rejected Israel’s recent counter-offer concerning a truce in Gaza, instead reaffirming its commitment to a proposal developed with mediation by Egypt and Qatar.
This mediated plan, originally framed on Jan. 17, proposes a 50-day halt in hostilities and a step-by-step process for exchanging Israeli hostages and Palestinian security prisoners. Under the terms of this framework, Hamas would release five Israeli hostages, including American-Israeli citizen Edan Alexander, in several phases. In return, Israel would free approximately 250 imprisoned Palestinian terrorists along with 2,000 terrorist suspects detained following the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks.
The initiative also includes a pause in Israeli military actions and the reopening of border crossings to allow for the import of aid.
Israel’s proposal includes demands such as the full disarmament of Hamas and does not guarantee a complete military withdrawal from Gaza. It also calls for the immediate, unconditional release of Alexander among 10 to 12 live hostages, as well as the return of the bodies of deceased captives.
“Do not forget hostages and do everything in your power to make sure they are heard, make sure it doesn’t go away. The Jewish community is a global community and we have to be there for the hostages. Today, it happens in Israel but tomorrow it could be somewhere else. Terrorism is everywhere and we do not leave hostages and injured people behind,” Ohel said.
“Alon is an innocent civilian who was taken from Israel. He did not want this but we need to make sure he is heard so that when he comes back, he will change the world. I hope he will bring about peace and prosperity because of what he went through,” she prayed.
“I hope all the hostages will be a beacon of light for the world and bring change. I will never give up until my son and all the hostages return and neither should you. We should look at it as an opportunity to make things better. Be with us and do that,” she concluded.