10/07/2026
Three years since October 7.
Three years of immeasurable loss, and of lives divided in an instant into before and after.
That morning, more than 1,200 people were murdered, and 251 were taken hostage in Gaza. Babies and children were murdered and kidnapped. Women were r***d and subjected to sexual violence. Entire families were killed. Homes were set on fire. People were tortured and shot in front of their families. Some hostages came home only to learn that their parents, children, or partners had been murdered. No number can contain what happened. Behind every number are lives, faces, names, families, and entire worlds destroyed in a single day.
It hurts to remember the people we lost. It hurts to think of the families living with an empty chair, of parents who lost a child, siblings who lost a brother or sister, grandparents who lost a grandchild. It hurts to remember the faces of the hostages and the days we waited for them, not knowing how we could bear one more day of waiting. And it hurts to think of those who returned, but not to the lives they had known, those who came home to find that the people they loved were no longer there, and to a reality no one could have prepared them for.
My cousin, Ben Bernstein, a commander in the Duvdevan Unit, was murdered in Kfar Aza. Over these three years, my thoughts have returned to his parents, his brother, his sister, his grandparents, and his whole family. To their empty chair, to the son, brother, and grandson taken from them, and to the lives changed forever. I see people I love carrying a loss there is no way to ease, and I want with all my heart to do something, anything, to give back even a small part of what they lost. But there is no way to restore their world. All we can do is be there, stay close, and not let them stand alone in their pain.
My life, too, has been divided into before and after. Before that day, I could believe that security was something we could take for granted, that an unimaginable tragedy happened to other people, that I could hold Israel in my heart and still be protected by the distance. Now I know there is no distance. Every report from Israel is personal. Every family harmed is our family. Every fallen soldier and every home abandoned leaves a mark on me.
I never imagined that, even at my age, I would become a different person. October 7 stripped away my layers of protection, but it also revealed strengths I did not know I had. I did not know how deep my inner strength ran, how far I would be willing to go to help, how many doors I would knock on, or how many times I would push back against refusals and bureaucracy. I did not know I could keep going when my heart was aching and my strength was running out. I learned that strength does not mean I never break. I break, I grow tired, and I hurt. Strength is finding another reason to get up, another way to act, another person I can try to help.
Three years of action grew out of that pain. We raised support, brought people together, organized, brought doctors and medical aid, opened doors, and fought through systems and bureaucracy to reach those who needed help. Those of us far from Israel were not truly far away. People across the Diaspora mobilized, donated, volunteered, traveled, called, and searched for ways to be there. Wherever we could extend a hand, we tried to do so.
Along the way, I met extraordinary people who gave of themselves without hesitation. I met friends who became family, and formed connections with people who will stay with me and in my heart for the rest of my life. The love and solidarity that grew through this work filled a place in me I had not known was so empty. They did not replace the people we lost or erase the absence, but they reminded me that even in the deepest rupture, it is possible to find meaning, connection, and the strength to continue.
I also met a very small number of people who tried to take advantage of the situation. But they are not the story. The story is the great majority who came to help, care, rescue, listen, and act.
And we watched our young people rise in the moment of truth. A generation we thought would need more time before it was ready to lead proved it could take responsibility, volunteer, act, and lead. They did not wait for someone to tell them what to do. They saw what was needed and stepped forward. In my eyes, they proved themselves with a strength we had never seen before.
Over these three years, Israel has also fought back. Hamas lost its leadership, Nasrallah was eliminated, Hezbollah’s capabilities were severely weakened, and Israel acted directly against Iran, striking infrastructure and missile systems. All the hostages were returned to Israel, both the living and the deceased. These are extraordinary achievements, won at an immense cost. They do not bring back those who were murdered, heal the families, or erase the trauma. But they also tell the story of a people who refused to surrender their fate to those who sought to destroy them.
Throughout these three years, we have also had to explain to the world what happened to us. We thought that after a massacre like this, we would not have to prove the facts, that after murder, kidnapping, and r**e, the world would know how to distinguish between the victims and the murderers. But even now, we are blamed, persecuted, and the people who murdered us are met with understanding. Instead of standing with those who were killed, some demand that we explain our right to defend ourselves.
I still cannot understand how anyone can see what was done to us on October 7 and still choose to hate us. How can anyone look at families who lost their children, people who returned from captivity, human beings who lost their homes, and point an accusing finger at them? There is the pain of what was done to us, and then there is the added pain of knowing that the world knows, and still does not always want to see.
So what defines us? Not that we were never broken. We were broken. Not that we were never afraid. We were afraid. And not that we managed to save everyone. We did not.
What defines us is what we did from within that rupture. We got up, showed up, fought, cared for the wounded, raised support, helped, opened doors, and carried one another. We are a nation of heroes, not because pain spared us, but because even in pain we continue to see the person in front of us, reach out a hand, and help carry what no one should have to carry alone.
Three years since October 7. Three years of waking each morning carrying that day with me, through the families left behind, the people I have met, every door I try to open, and every person I might be able to help, even a little. I am no longer who I was before that day. I cannot get that version of myself back, but I have discovered strengths I never knew I had, along with a capacity for love, solidarity, and action whose depth I had never imagined.
There is nothing good about this catastrophe. No act of service can justify it, and no love can erase the loss. But after everything that happened, we continue to choose one another. We continue to be there for the families, the soldiers, the wounded, Israel, and anyone who needs a hand.
I wake up with October 7. I carry it with me every day. And still, I wake with everything it revealed in us, with strengths I did not know I had, with the people I have met, with the friendships and solidarity born through this work, and with this people, wounded to the depths of our soul, yet still showing up, fighting, rescuing, giving, and loving. None of this erases the loss or repairs what was broken. It is proof that even after everything, they could not take away who we are.
This post is dedicated to Ben. Since October 7, every day of mine begins and ends with him.
