Avinatan Or escaped his Hamas captors in Gaza by digging his way out of a tunnel, but was later found and beaten for days, he told an audience at the Jewish Federations of North America General Assembly in Washington, DC, on Sunday night.
“My engineering background saved me. I count in steps. I collected data. I built a small [lightbulb] from broken cables. I planned an escape route in my head. I told myself, ‘You will not let others decide your destiny,’ and I tried to escape,” Or related from a podium, standing next to Noa Argamani, Evyatar David and Guy Gilboa-Dalal – all former Hamas hostages.
“I dug for weeks through sandbags, through a collapsed tunnel toward the surface. I made myself work to change my own destiny. One day, as I was digging, I hit the root of a tree. I smelled it. It felt like touching life in a place of death,” he continued.
“One night,” he went on, “I reached the outside. I saw stars for the first time in years. I wrote ‘Hostage’ on a white sandbag, planning my next step. But they found out.”
Or, 32, said that he was beaten by his captors “for days,” and was tied to a chair for a week. “I was sure I would die there,” he said.
But even then, he continued, he wrote three things next to his bed: “This too shall pass,” “patience” and “let it be.”
These words “kept me going,” he said. “I had too much time to think about life [in the tunnels]. I used to believe I had bad luck. How could this happen to me? Now I understand something different. Everything in my life – my childhood, my parents, my education, my army service, working in construction, studying engineering – all of it made me who I am. And who I am is what kept me alive.”
Or went on to say that he does not see himself as a hero. “I didn’t choose to be a hostage. The heroes are the soldiers, the ones who choose to fight for others.”
The former hostage thanked Israeli forces for saving many lives, adding that now he wants to help them. “That is my next mission,” he stressed.
Or, David and Gilboa-Dalal were released on October 13 as part of Israel’s ceasefire deal with Hamas, having endured 738 days in captivity.
Argamani, Or’s girlfriend, was rescued in a special operation by Israeli security forces on June 8, 2024, named “Operation Arnon” after Commander Arnon Zamora, the only serviceman killed during the operation.
The couple was kidnapped from the Nova music festival near the Gaza border on October7.
Argamani being forcefully separated from Or by the terrorists was captured on film and has become one of the most iconic and harrowing images of that day.
To get more Israel news, click here to sign up for our free Israel Briefing newsletter.