Herzliya, Israel – Every morning, Shelly Shem Tov entered the empty room of her son and recited chapter 20 of the biblical book of psalms, an ancient supplication for liberation.
Meanwhile, she did not know that her son, Omer Shem Tov, was pronouncing exactly the same verses as Psalm 20 – “May the Lord answer you on the day of anguish.”
He had adopted the same daily ritual about 40 meters deep, alone, in a Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip.
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Omer Shem Tov was 20 years old when he was captured by armed men during the October 7, 2023 attack in southern Israel. He grew up in a mostly secular home and led a relatively careless life after fulfilling compulsory military service-working as a waiter at a steakhouse to raise money for a post-external journey to South America, a popular rite among many Israeli of his age.
He was captured while fleeing the new music festival, a rave with thousands of participants near the Gaza border.
A few days after the captivity, he said, began to talk to God. Made promises. He began to bless any food he received. And they had asked – some of which believe they were answered.
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“You are looking for something to support yourself, to hold on,” Shem Tov said in a recent interview at the family home in Herzliya, north of Tel Aviv. “The first place I turned I was to God. I felt a strength to come into myself,” he said.
“Faith kept me firm,” he added, “I always believed I would come home, although I didn’t know how or when.”
He was released in late February as part of a temporary ceasefire agreement after 505 days in Gaza.
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Shem Tov, who turned 22 during the captivity, said he always had faith, but was never a practitioner.
Many other liberated hostages reported similar experiences, finding comfort and strength to survive to connect or reconnect with God and remember often forgotten Jewish rituals.
Some of the captured said they found to continue in a motto they heard from Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an Israeli-American hostage, before being killed by the kidnappers. It was a version of a quote on having a purpose in the life of the German philosopher atheist Friedrich Nietzsche, often quoted by Viktor Frankl, Austrian and surviving psychiatrist of the Holocaust: “He who has one why he can stand any like.”
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The capture
On October 7, Shem Tov fled the men armed with a torn field near the festival site with his friend Maya Regev and her brother, Itai Regev, who was then 18.
Ori Danino, another member of the group who had known a few hours before the festival, managed to leave the car danger zone. But he called them, asked them to send their location and came back to pick them up.
On the road, the gunmen opened fire against the car, injuring the Regev. The four were kidnapped and taken to Gaza. Danino was taken separately. He and five other hostages-among them Goldberg-Polin-were shot dead by the kidnappers, the Israeli army said in a precarious tunnel in southern Gaza in August last year.
Shem Tov said that as soon as Gaza arrived, he was downloaded to the ground inside a plastic container by a winch. His first instinct was trying to connect with the kidnappers, presenting himself and asking his names. One of them asked if he knew the songs of Eden Ben Zaken, Israeli pop singer. He sang the chorus of “Queen of Roses,” one of her hits.
He said he was forced to walk the tunnels and arrived at a house with yellow sofas and a chandelier. From there, he was taken to the first apartment where he would be detained and was soon accompanied by Regev, who received some rudimentary treatment for the injuries. Maya Regev was later transferred to a Palestinian hospital, and the brothers were released along with dozens of hostages during a brief ceasefire in November 2023.
Shem Tov said he was transferred several times, usually at night, and once dressed like a Muslim woman with a veil. He said he and Itai Regev were almost hit by Israeli air strikes, including one that shattered their bedroom windows and filled him with black and dense dust.
A week after capture, Shem Tov said he decided to keep kosher food as much as possible, eating either cheese or canned meat when he received both, in accordance with Jewish dietary laws that prohibit mixing meat and dairy. He promised God that if he returned home, he would pray daily with tefilin – The small leather boxes containing scriptures that the faithful tie on the head and left arm to the morning prayers.
He said the first miracle was surviving the initial attack without injury. A picture of the blue car showed the windshield on the passenger side, where he was sitting, shrewd by bullets. “Even now, when I look at her, I’m shocked to have left alive,” he said.
After the end of the ceasefire in November 2023, Shem Tov was taken back to the tunnels and passed the rest of the captivity alone, except for the armed men who watched him.
Now at home, Shem Tov, like other liberated hostages, is still recovering.
His father said he came back more mature, more focused. Shem Tov wants to study to be an actor and recently returned from a lecture tour in Jewish communities in the United States.
And he said he prays daily in his room with tefilin.
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