I returned from New York with my daughters Yuval, Ofir, and Oren. There, we participated in a march of hostage families, met with diplomats, and received a big embrace from the Jewish communities. The fatigue from the journeys is clearly felt, but I returned with strength.
Many, many people think about us there, across the sea. They want what's good for us and understand the depth of the crisis and the necessity to bring back the hostages immediately.
Everyone in one heartbeat – that's saving the lives of all those surviving in captivity for so long, with infinite courage and bravery, second after second. It's giving the final and necessary honor to those murdered in terrible ways, whose families are waiting for them so much.
Everyone in one heartbeat – that's bringing ourselves back to us, returning breath to the lungs, finally starting to treat wounds that still can't heal, and allowing families to begin rehabilitation from the abyss. These are masses of Israelis who know their country did the right thing. That's me, Yuval, Ofir, and Oren choosing what will be written on the tombstone of beloved Yossi Sharabi, the man with the biggest heart we knew, placing a flower and knowing we can start trying to get up.
My heart breaks again and again when I look at my daughters, who so need this closure after everything they went through, and our country doesn't allow it for them. I so want to see them on the day after, dealing with the loss alongside the return to life. Spending time, enjoying, making mistakes, learning, like girls who went through hell, and it's behind them.
But as long as our Yossi Sharabi is there – the hell is still here. I call from here to the government of Israel – let this nightmare end. Everyone in one heartbeat.
"They took my heart from me"
The daughter, Ofir Sharabi: When your life is on "hold," you feel like you keep waking up to the same reality every morning. A year and a half ago, I was in New York, on a mission of young people, with the goal of bringing back my dad. A year and a half passed, so much time, and here we returned again from a trip to New York. We marched, we shouted, we continued to explain and show our pain in order to bring back Dad and everyone. What else will I need to say for someone to listen? This is my dad, not some game. But they made decisions without thinking about us, and those decisions led to him losing his life, and us losing him.
They took my heart from me, the dad who protects his little girl, the back that stands behind me. The little that can be done for him, and that must be done, is to bring him back to us as quickly as possible without waiting, and without hearing about another hostage who is no longer with us. I see my country choosing death over life so many times. I lost my dad, but it could have been different. I could have been a 16-year-old girl whose dad returned from captivity. Now I'm a 16-year-old girl fighting so her dad will have a grave. In what world does this make sense?!
My life stopped on October 7, and since then, I'm no longer the same Ofir. I so want to wake up to a different, better reality. I won't stop fighting for this reality, for all of us.
