For Yehuda Beinin, a grueling wait has ended in joy and grief. Hamas took the man’s daughter Liat and her husband Aviv hostage during the Oct. 7 terror attack at Kibbutz Nir Oz — where a quarter of the 400 residents were reported killed, captured or missing. His family spent more than 50 days hoping for news, and watching each hostage release.
On Wednesday, Hamas finally let Liat go in the second-to-last exchange. But the family’s joy lasted less than 24 hours, before they got another phone call informing them of the death of Liat’s husband, Aviv, on the first day of the fighting on Oct. 7.
The Beinin family is spread out, but close-knit: Beinin grew up in Metuchen and attended Rutgers. He moved to Israel in 1982 and now lives in norther Israel. His two daughters have dual citizenship. Liat settled there, and daughter Tal lives in Oregon. Now they’ve gathered to plan Aviv’s funeral.
“We will mourn and rejoice together as strange and difficult as that is,” Beinin told NJ Spotlight News.
Now that the weeklong ceasefire’s come to a sudden end and hostage exchanges paused, his thoughts turn to the other families, noting, “People are terrified of the ramifications of what renewed fighting means.”
He tried to describe the feeling of waiting without word to hear of a loved one in captivity.
“My family’s personal tragedy aside, there’s still many people hanging between the sky and the ground, hanging in mid air, you would say English,” he said. “And my heart goes out to them.”
