Former hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen performs deeply moving concert of songs conceived in Gaza

For this week’s performance, a year and a half after his return to Israel, hundreds of people sat on the lawn in the kibbutz to listen to Dekel-Chen sing and speak, including almost every resident.

A huge crowd gathered on the lawn of Kibbutz Nir Oz for the concert (photo: Ben Conway)[Missing Credit]

The evening was deeply emotional, as the songs recounted Dekel-Chen’s harrowing time in captivity.

One of his songs was dedicated to his wife, Mili, and about “a man who can’t tell his wife he loves her”, Dekel-Chen said. He added that it was the hardest song for him to write.

While he performed the song, called Thank You for my Mili, the camera was repeatedly fixed on her, with Mili mouthing the words as he sang them.

He also had songs written for each of his daughters – now three of them, as Mili gave birth to Shachar Mazal while he was in Gaza.

The song for his eldest, Bari, who was six years old when he was kidnapped, was called A Bag Full of Hearts, with violins providing the backing for his voice.

He described his middle child, Gali, who was two years old on October 7, as a “smile factory”. The song for her, Latino in style, was much more upbeat than the last. Fellow ex-hostage Eitan Horn joined him for the song, helping with the backing vocals.

The soft, goosebumps-inducing song for his youngest, Shachar Mazal, was called Don’t Know Your Name Yet, and featured the xylophone.

The audience at the live broadcast in north London (photo: Adam Soller Photography)[Missing Credit]

Another song was about his dreams in captivity, which he said were the “cruellest dreams imaginable”.

“I dreamed so often there… sometimes my friends [fellow captives] would wake me up because while I was sleeping, I was pulling an imaginary trigger.”

The song had the backing of a choir and was immersive and powerful. In good dreams, he said, he didn’t become rich, famous, or successful – he just returned home to Nir Oz. “No special occasion, simply a simple day,” one of the lyrics said.

Sagui Dekel-Chen returns from Hamas captivity[Missing Credit]

 

On October 7, Dekel-Chen joined the rapid response team upon hearing gunshots in the kibbutz. He was shot in the shoulder before being abducted.

He learnt upon his release that most of the rapid response team alongside him were among the 56 people from Kibbutz Nir Oz murdered on October 7. A further 13 residents were killed while in captivity in Gaza, including Shiri, Ariel, and Kfir Bibas.

Dekel-Chen said that he was “suffering from terrible guilt” while a hostage, acting under the assumption that his family had not survived, though tried to convince himself of the opposite.

“In the imaginary world I had created, my girls were the end of the tunnel,” he said.

Dekel-Chen singing (photo: Ben Conway)[Missing Credit]

When he learnt of his impending release, he said that he started “planning the funeral, where I am going to bury them, what is the grave going to look like, what am I going to say, [and] what songs will I play”.

As he said this, he switched from Hebrew to English so that his young daughters, all of whom were on the lawn – although Gali was fast asleep – would not understand what he was saying.

He continued to describe a moment early in his captivity when he was held with three terrorists who had a radio, and when they switched the stations he heard a few seconds of a song, which was unmistakably Fields of Gold by Sting.

Israeli-American hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen being released from Gaza, surrounded by Hamas terrorists (Photo: Getty)AFP via Getty Images

He decided that would be the song to play at their funeral. That story made the subsequent rendition of the song extremely moving; soft, slow, and with the audience in north London gently singing along.

During the evening, he was joined by various Israeli performers on stage, including Idan Raichel and Marina Maximilian Blumin.

Mili, his wife of more than two decades, also came on stage. She spoke to the audience, sharing their life since her husband’s return.

“When I imagined life with Sagui after his return, I imagined it would be like a second marriage,” she said. “And it’s true we will never go back to the way things used to be, but together, you and I will create a new reality for ourselves.”

Mili in the audience (photo: Ben Conway)[Missing Credit]

Back in north London, before the broadcast a speech was delivered by Gideon Falter, the CEO of Campaign Against Antisemitism, who is also the vice chairman of JNF UK.

He said that Dekel-Chen is “someone of quiet courage, deep commitment, [and] a man who has always been keen to build, and to serve, and to take responsibility for the people around him”.

And he highlighted the former hostage’s “enduring Jewish insistence that even from the darkest places, we must choose stories, we must choose light, and we must be determined to carry our faith and our people forward”.

The JC was an exclusive media partner for the event.