“When I walk into my home, the first thing I do is to look around to make sure that one of the guards from my time in Syrian captivity isn’t waiting for me. After that, I turn on the light in the bathroom and check that there’s no guard there. It was that way before October 7, too. Since the war broke out, I’m on tenterhooks the whole time. Maybe it’s because of the sight of terrorists wandering around our communities, entering homes and all the talks about it. The images from the past keep coming back to me.”

Col. (Res.) Amnon Sharon, 76, was captured by Syrian forces during the Yom Kippur War and was released some eight months later. He was an artillery officer at the time, married with a young son and awaiting the birth of a second child. “I was born in captivity, in a detainment camp in Cyprus, where my Holocaust-survivor parents were sent when their immigrant ship – the Haim Arlozoroff – ran aground,” he says.

A quarter of a century later, Sharon was one of 301 IDF soldiers to be taken as prisoners of war. Most of them were captured on the Egyptian front, some in Syria and a handful in Lebanon. The October 7 terror attack and the war that erupted in the Gaza Strip, exactly 50 years after the Yom Kippur War, took Sharon right back to the day that he found himself on the wrong side. “There’s nothing you can do,” he says. “There’s no way of escaping captivity.”

There are currently 530 Israelis who are recognized by the defense establishment as having been POWs or hostages. Around 300 of them are also recognized as disabled IDF veterans. For some of them, the massive upheaval caused by the October 7 attack and the abduction of more than 240 civilians and soldiers by Hamas terrorists had led to a significant emotional and functional regression. Traumatic memories of their time in captivity are never far from their thoughts. Feelings of abandonment and betrayal flood their minds again. The post-traumatic symptoms that they have experienced since then are getting worse. Igal Kohlany, the chairman of Awake at Night, a non-profit organization which advocates for former POWs, says that since the outbreak of the war, the number of former POWs asking for emotional support or additional assistance from the Defense Ministry’s Rehabilitation Department has increased markedly. “Some of them are deeply affected by their memories, they suffer from inability to concentrate and they have regressed to the situation where they do not sleep at night. The nights are the most difficult,” he says. “There are certain things which spark insomnia and it can happen without warning. Sometimes, just seeing a certain photograph can take you back to captivity.”

Kohlany was taken captive when he was just 19. “I personally know 15 former POWs who have become virtually housebound since October 7. I hear about it from their wives or children. They don’t want to leave the house and they just want to be left alone. We know exactly what our hostages are going through right now. We are hugely disappointed that history is repeating itself.”

When did it start?

“This distress began already on October 7, even before the number of hostages became apparent. The start was very similar to what we experienced: alone, surrounded, out of ammunition, no supplies, and the mighty army didn’t come. We waited hours and the hours became days – and no one came.”

Members of Awake at Night did not stand idly by and, after the war broke out, they approached various bodies and organizations, offering to provide counseling to freed hostages and the families of those still being held.

Prof. Avi Ohri, a senior physician in the rehabilitation division of the Reuth Tel Aviv Rehabilitation Hospital, was also a POW during the Yom Kippur War and spent two months in Egyptian captivity. He was 25 years old at the time, a paramedic in the reserves serving on the Suez Canal. Throughout his career, he has treated many former POWs. “For some of them, every new trauma exacerbates their post-traumatic stress disorder. We saw it happen during the Gulf War, during the coronavirus pandemic and even more so during Operation Swords of Iron,” he explains.

What do they say about the past six months?

“They report symptoms such as hyperarousal, new dreams about their time in captivity, self-isolation and a lack of desire to be in communication with others. Some of them will only spend time in places that are close to a bomb shelter. The symptoms that they experienced before October 7 have gotten worse and more pervasive.”

Prof. Zahava Solomon: “The trauma of betrayal, the sense that we are abandoned to our fate, is very strong right now. People who served during the Yom Kippur War on the banks of the Suez Canal and the outposts feel the same things that the IDF spotters and residents of the Gaza envelope experienced on October 7."

“Everything Happened Again Exactly the Same Way; Have We Not Learned Anything?”

In 2023, Shomrim published a special report about former POWs from the Yom Kippur War. We revisited some of the people we interviewed for that article and in conversations with them now, their sorrow and pain for the hostages is a constant theme. They also do not want to complain about their own suffering or to portray themselves as victims. More than anything else, they want to help, to give their support and to show others that it is possible to recover from being a hostage, to raise a family and to pursue a career.

“I spend a lot of time thinking about our hostages. What they are experiencing in captivity is even worse than what we did. People always talked about how tough and cruel the Syrians are and we saw that in the torture we endured – but now the cruelty is even worse,” says 70-year-old Izhar Damari from Herzliya. “In the Yom Kippur War, it was army against army and there was a state of war. Now, it’s civilians against terrorists, with no preparation, including women, children and old people. Also, we were not kept underground for most of the time we were in captivity, which is what is happening now in the tunnels.”

Damari says that he was awake the whole night before our interview. In the evening, he watched a video showing a knife-wielding terrorist leaning over two bodies, which he proceeded to mutilate. “That made me think about the abuse that I suffered in Syria,” he says. “I never sleep soundly, but now it’s worse than ever. It throws me back in time and brings memories flooding back more strongly than in the past, because the whole issue of captivity is alive and being talked about incessantly. I listen to interviews with hostages who have been freed and their testimony about sexual abuse and torture. That raises very troubling images for me and keeps me awake at night.”

The events of October 7 sent Damari’s thoughts back to 1973, when he served in an intelligence unit on Mount Hermon, and to the intelligence failure that led to the Yom Kippur War. “Then, too, the collection units did outstanding work; the same cannot be said of the Research Department, which is responsible for analyzing the raw material. I was a member of a collection unit and I know exactly what intel I relayed on the night between Friday and Saturday. It’s exactly the same as what happened last October,” he says. “Our position did not fall on Saturday, either, but on Sunday afternoon. We held out for 24 hours without being overrun and even then, we sat there waiting for reinforcements, asking ourselves where the IDF was. No one came. Everything happened again exactly the same way; copy-paste. Have we not learned anything? I can only pray that it never repeats itself.”

According to Damari, the first five months in captivity, when he was subjected to interrogation and torture, were the worst for him. “After that, the Red Cross entered the picture and they also stopped torturing us because there was nothing left to interrogate us over,” he says. “One of the first questions that the Syrian commando asked us was, ‘Where are the girls?’ They were looking for female soldiers. In retrospect, we realized that the Syrians had been observing the Hermon outpost the whole time. On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, a few days before the outbreak of the war, we had a visit from some female soldiers who performed with a singer. The Syrians saw them. We explained that there are no girls serving at the outpost and they beat us for that. It was patently obvious what their intentions were. When people talk about the female hostages, it brings back those memories. It’s not easy.”

Damari is a social worker. He is married with three children and five grandchildren and served as CEO of the AKIM Guardianship organization. Now, he is revisiting his late parents and siblings’ accounts of their many months of protests at Kings of Israel Square (now Rabin Square) to secure the release of the POWs. The POWs who were held by Egypt were released first and for months the square was known as “POWs in Syria Square.”

According to Damari, just as they did half a century ago, his siblings attend rallies in what has now become known as “Hostage Square,” adjacent to Tel Aviv Museum, where tens of thousands of Israelis protest for the return of the hostages in Gaza. “There’s no question that what is happening today has led to a regression,” he says. “So much so that I do not have the emotional strength to participate in the protests. I just can’t go. I can’t bear to see the families suffering. But I am still hooked on the news, waiting for good news.”

“One of the first questions that the Syrian commando asked us was, ‘Where are the girls?’ They were looking for female soldiers. It was patently obvious what their intentions were. When people talk about the female hostages, it brings back those memories. It’s not easy.”

“Every Passing Hour is Harder Than the Previous One. You’re Alone”

Damari’s sister, Orna Laniado, lives not far from her brother in Ramat Hasharon. Her husband, Yoram, was also a POW during the Yom Kippur War. “We are a family with POWs on both sides. I was held by the Egyptians and Izhar by the Syrians,” says Yoram, a father of three and grandfather of eight. Before retirement, he was self-employed.

“Nobody looked after us, nobody even saw us. After the Gulf War, I had a fall and had to stop working,” he says with a tone of criticism. “My heart is with the hostages, the whole time, and every passing hour is harder than the previous one. You’re alone, bound, locked in a single cell, not knowing when you’ll get out. At first, I thought it was all a bad dream, I couldn’t believe it was real. The Gaza hostages also don’t know what their fate will be. They were ripped away from peace and tranquility. They went from zero to one hundred. I feel them and it takes me back to that period. There are thoughts that I try to keep away but they always come back to me. It’s in our DNA and it never passes.”

Laniado says that when he and his wife went to Hostage Square, he could not bring himself to talk to the families. “I felt that it wasn’t appropriate. These people are going through hell at the moment and there’s nothing I could say to encourage them. There’s no solace for them right now,” he says. “Even somebody in prison knows when they are going to be released and in what state. They don’t know when the hostages will be freed and what condition they will be in: alive, dead, missing an arm or a leg.”

“I have a feeling that, over the years, people have forgotten the trauma and when this terrible massacre happened, everything burst out again,” says Orna Laniado. “One day, I just broke down in tears at home. I couldn’t stop crying. During the first week, Izhar sent me a text message saying that he’s watching the hostages’ families on television and weeping and that now he understands what our mother and I went through. It brought everything back. And still, there is a huge difference here, because there are also children, women and old people being held hostage. For years I have been attending workshops for relatives of former POWs and I have someone who listens to me. From the low point we were at when they were in captivity, we dealt with it and we maintained a routine in life. You can grow anew from that place.”

Damari served in the reserves for 40 years as a casualty notification officer for the IDF’s Tel Aviv unit. “I was present hundreds of times when families were informed that their loved one had been killed or wounded. At the start of the current war, I told the army that I was willing to volunteer to serve again,” he says. Asked what his primary message would be to freed hostages, Damari has no hesitation. “Use whatever professional counseling you can,” he says. “Take advantage of the resources that the state will offer you. Don’t try to deal with it alone because it will be even harder.”

To the families of the hostages still being held in Gaza, he has this to say: “Be strong. Use anybody you can in order to make things happen quicker.”

“My heart is with the hostages, the whole time, and every passing hour is harder than the previous one. They went from zero to one hundred. I feel them and it takes me back to that period. There are thoughts that I try to keep away but they always come back to me. It’s in our DNA and it never passes.”

Sculpting the Trauma

“When I went to Hostage Square, I tried to give the families some encouragement,” says Amnon Sharon. “I told them that until they hear otherwise, they have to believe that the outcome will be positive and good. They must not listen to rumors, which can ruin families. When I was a POW, my wife and mother heard a rumor that all of the POWs in Syria had been murdered. Yet here I am.”

Over the past few months, Sharon has visited injured soldiers in hospital. “I tell them that I was blown up in a tank, that I was severely wounded with terrible burns – and then when I was in captivity, they broke so many bones that my body was smashed. And then I show them that now I’m okay, that I rehabilitated myself, that life can be beautiful again.”

Despite the severe injuries with which Sharon returned from Syrian captivity, which left him partially disabled and medically exempt from the military, he went back into the army. He served in a number of roles as a noncommissioned officer and a commander in the reserves. He says that he did not speak a word about his time in captivity for the first 14 years after his release. Later, he was recognized by the Defense Ministry as suffering from PTSD. Over time, he started to talk about what he went through. He was held completely alone for five months in a dark, dank cell. Even when he was moved to a different wing with other POWs, his captors kept his eyes covered at all times.

“I learned to live with the trauma,” he says, explaining that, years later, he led seminars on captivity in the IDF and gave survival lessons to Special Forces units. Now he works as a rehabilitation coach at the Reuth Tel Aviv Rehabilitation Hospital. He says that, during the course of the current conflict, he got a phone call from an officer for whose soldiers he once gave a lecture. The commander said that his soldiers, who were fighting in Gaza, talk about the coping mechanisms they learned from Sharon. “So, now it is like I am also in Gaza, holding somebody’s hand,” he says.

Eventually, Sharon found emotional healing in art. He is an ardent sculptor in a workshop at the Beit Halochem rehabilitation center in Tel Aviv. He recently created a sculpture of Shiri Bibas and her two redheaded toddlers, Kfir and Ariel, who are still being held in Gaza. Their father, Yarden, is being held elsewhere in the Strip. “My heart breaks for that family,” he says. “I have nine grandchildren – all of them are redheads.”

He showed the sculpture at a recent exhibition of his works based on his memories of his time in captivity. In stark contrast, there is also a statue of the cruelest Syrian guard who watched over him. “I called him Eagle-Eyes,” he says. “Ever since I was released, I wake up at 3 A.M. every day and sometimes I can see him standing there over my bed. I discovered that there are other former POWs who wake up at exactly that time. We came to the conclusion that that was when the guards switched shifts and then they would come and beat us. Ever since I put the statue of the guard in my exhibition, he’s stopped coming to me at night.”

Sharon recently created a sculpture of Shiri Bibas and her two redheaded toddlers, Kfir and Ariel, who are still being held in Gaza. Their father, Yarden, is being held elsewhere in the Strip. “My heart breaks for that family,” he says. “I have nine grandchildren – all of them are redheads.”

‘My Children Had No One to Talk to’

Col. (Res.) Dr. Michael (Micky) Seiffe, who was taken captive by the Egyptians in the Yom Kippur War, is one of the oldest reservists fighting in the current conflict. At the age of 78, he serves as head of the General Staff’s blood service unit under the IDF’s Chief Medical Officer. “There’s no way that something is happening in the State of Israel and I’m not there,” says Seiffe, who was called up at the start of the war. “A few months ago, I marked 60 years in the army. This is my ninth war. I try to imagine what the hostages are going through compared to what we went through, but there is only a partial common denominator. We were in the army, in a state of war. We knew that there was a chance we would be injured, killed or taken as a POW. These are civilians who were dragged from their beds and their homes, who were not ready in any sense for the possibility that they would encounter the enemy up close. It’s a far greater trauma.”

“In the end, captivity is captivity is captivity,” he adds. “You lose your freedom, your desires and control over your life. In that respect, you are erased. You are tortured, starved, cut off from the world; you are in constant fear for your life. I was in a dungeon, chained by my hands, feet and neck – like an animal being readied for slaughter. I cannot explain why I am still alive. And still, emotionally speaking, I was not in captivity. In my mind, I was at home, at university, with my parents and family at a concert. Over the years, I rehabilitated myself and I learned to live with the trauma. In my case, the trauma strengthened many sides of me.”

Damari, like the others interviewed for this article, had nothing but praise for the activities of the Rehabilitation Department and its commander, Limor Luria. He says that in the six months since the war in Gaza broke out, the Rehabilitation Department has reached out to former POWs, asking how they were coping and whether they needed any assistance. “For years, the State of Israel left former POWs to their own devices. After 25 years when nobody was in contact with us at all, the situation has changed,” he says. “The various IDF units have adopted the former POWs and the Rehabilitation Department is offering new and innovative services, like family therapy. Back then, my children had no one to talk to.”

“I want to say this to the state: Do not forget the hostages who have returned from captivity,” says Prof. Ohri, who also offers counseling to hostages’ families. “Based on a survey we conducted of former POWs from the Yom Kippur War, we discovered that the trauma could reemerge after many years, in a variety of ways: emotional, physical, health, employment. There must be supervision and we must learn from experience.”

"We were in the army, in a state of war. We knew that there was a chance we would be injured, killed or taken as a POW. These are civilians who were dragged from their beds and their homes, who were not ready in any sense for the possibility that they would encounter the enemy up close. It’s a far greater trauma.”

High-Risk of Illness, too

The experience to which Ohri is referring is a decades-long study being conducted at Tel Aviv University. The study, which started in 1992, examines the mental and physical condition of former POWs from the Yom Kippur War. The first groundbreaking stage of the study was conducted by Ohri, Prof. Zahava Solomon and Prof. Yuval Neria. Solomon is also head of the National Council for Post Trauma, which advised the Health Ministry on how the hostages released from Gaza should be received.

Solomon, an expert in traumatic stress and psychiatric epidemiology and an Israel Prize laureate for her social work research, now leads the study. “Captivity is not going anywhere,” she says. “Inevitably, similarity to a traumatic experience will always lead to sensitivity and vulnerability. In this war, there are clear references to experiences that are similar to those of the Yom Kippur War POWs and some of them are experiencing reactivation – their past trauma comes back to them – even though it happened 50 years ago. The whole issue of captivity, of being a hostage, of being held at the whim of your captor, of being in a very aggressive environment, sometimes being totally alone – all that is something that is central to the public discourse right now – and it takes them back to their own experiences. It’s like a wound or a broken bone; when you put pressure on it, you can feel that it is damaged.”

Decades of research show that captivity can have long-term effects, including increased risk of PTSD and associated psychiatric ailments (very high rates of depression and anxiety, for example); somatic illness (ailments that are influenced or caused by emotional distress), premature aging (the study found, inter alia, that relatively young men were coming down with geriatric diseases) and the most worrying finding of all: early death.

Notwithstanding the findings of the study, which were brought to the attention of the Defense Ministry, Israel refused for more than 50 years to recognize the former POWs’ trauma and to grant them benefits accordingly. Through the Awake at Night NGO, a group of them petitioned the High Court, asking it to order the state to recognize the diseases they were suffering from as being the result of their time in captivity. “The damage that being a prisoner of war did is abstract, varied and profound,” Solomon wrote in 2015, following a series of findings which showed a clear connection between the trauma of being a POW and various ailments. “Former POWs are in a high-risk group not only for psychological disorders, but also for somatic comorbidities including heart disease, cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure and metabolic syndrome.”

“The trauma of betrayal, the sense that we are abandoned to our fate, is very strong right now,” Solomon says about the current situation. “People who served during the Yom Kippur War on the banks of the Suez Canal and the outposts feel the same things that the IDF spotters and residents of the Gaza envelope experienced on October 7. The strong sense of abandonment stings sharply. We see today, 50 years after, the damage it causes. The issue of sexual assault, which was silenced for many years, also brings back the trauma. We know that there were Yom Kippur War POWs who were sexually abused. People who were attacked felt ashamed and covered it up; some of them did not even want to tell their partners. Today, people are mainly talking about the female hostages who are being sexually abused; soon, they will be talking about the men, too.”

As someone who knows too well how the state – and some of the public – ignored, silences and sidelines the former Yom Kippur War POWs and other soldiers suffering from PTSD, Solomon says that “there is now a perceptible change in how trauma sufferers are treated. Israeli society moved from trauma- phobia, denial and ignoring, to a compassionate society which recognizes the distress of post-trauma and offers treatment for it.”