Returning home: How are Gaza border area residents rebuilding on the ashes of the past?

One year after October 7, the war is far from over. Hamas continues to hold 101 hostages in Gaza. Millions of Israelis are still living under daily rocket fire, and the country is on the brink of a potential broader regional war with the Islamic Republic of Iran and its terror proxies.

Yet amid the turmoil, trauma, and tragedy, there is also hope – hope to rebuild, rehabilitate, and return home to a better future.

One year later, residents of the Gaza periphery are trying to rebuild their lives. Some have been able to return home, though for many, this remains a distant dream.

The stories of Gaza border area towns and those hoping to return and rebuild

“Returning home – for us, it wasn’t even a question. This is our home,” Betty Gavri recently told The Jerusalem Post.

Gavri and her husband, Giora, were among the first members of Kibbutz Nir Am to return home.

“Giora was born here; his roots are here, and his family is buried here. This is his home and mine,” she said.

Gavri made aliyah to Israel in 1961 from Argentina as part of a youth movement, settling in Kibbutz Nir Am. There she met her husband, whose family was among the founding members, in 1943. They raised their four children and many grandchildren on the kibbutz.

“For me personally, I came here by choice. I lived in Argentina and grew up there at a time when it was a very advanced country. It was a welfare state; we were not persecuted. There were over half a million Jews, and we had a very active Jewish community, so the choice to come here, for me, was deliberate,” she said.

“The otef [Gaza envelope] was the place where youth movements and people came to out of an ideology. This is part of our strength but also part of the deep fracture that we now feel – the understanding that you come to the otef because you are Jewish and Zionist and the state needs to take care of you and protect you.”

According to Gavri, this unspoken and sacred bond was shattered on Oct 7, 2023.

“On October 7, when it began at 6:30 a.m., we were sleeping, like most of Israel, since it was a holiday. We woke up to sirens, and we knew this sound well because this is our reality since 2001,” she said. “But on this morning, it was very intense, and we immediately understood this was something unusual.”

Gavri is a member of Tzachi, a community emergency resilience team. Whenever there are sirens, she gathers at the kibbutz emergency headquarters to offer assistance and ensure the residents’ safety.

“On that morning, we couldn’t reach the headquarters because of the intensity of the rockets, and very soon, we started to hear not only sirens but also gunshots,” she said.

Gavri’s house is just 120 meters from the main gate of the kibbutz, where a massive battle would unfold between the kibbutz’s kitat konenut (anti-terror first response teams) and the Hamas terrorists.

“We have a very special story because the terrorists didn’t infiltrate our Kibbutz. The head of security and the kitat konenut fought off the terrorists from the inside, and eventually, the army fought from the outside, and we were able to neutralize them,” she said.

In fact, Nir Am was the only kibbutz on the Gaza border that was not infiltrated by terrorists. This was thanks to 26-year-old Inbal Lieberman, the kibbutz’s head of security.

Lieberman sent text messages to Gavri and the rest of the kibbutz members, ordering them to stay inside their safe rooms and lock the doors. She also instructed the maintenance members not to fix the electricity so that the terrorists wouldn’t be able to open and infiltrate the kibbutz’s main gate.

“We didn’t know how many there were. We didn’t know where they were. We couldn’t identify their strength, force, or capabilities, but we knew the kitat konenut was operating,” Gavri said. “Only at around 4 p.m. did the situation calm down a bit. The gunfire stopped, and we were able to go outside and see what had happened: We saw soldiers at our gate, and we saw the bodies of many terrorists outside the kibbutz.”

In the end, Lieberman and about a dozen volunteers from the kibbutz managed to hold off dozens of terrorists for hours until the army came to assist.  Not a single member of the kibbutz was killed due to their heroic actions.

“The feeling that they didn’t infiltrate us was incredible and a huge recognition and thank you to the kitat konenut. We know the difference between the kibbutzim that they did infiltrate and what happened to us. It is unbelievable, and they made all the difference,” Gavri said.

Later, at 3:30 a.m., the kibbutz members received a message from the IDF that two buses were waiting to evacuate everyone from their homes.

“Giora and I actually fell asleep and missed the phone call. We were woken up by a knock at the door and found out that almost everyone had left, and we were told to leave immediately,” she said.

A little over an hour later, at 7 a.m. on Oct. 8, they left with a small bag and drove to their eldest daughter’s home in Kibbutz Dvir, on the outskirts of Beersheba.

“We didn’t take much with us because nobody realized or thought we would be away for so long,” she said.

WHILE GAVRI lived at her daughter’s home in an area she referred to as the “Switzerland of Israel,” the vast majority of Kibbutz Nir Am relocated to Mishmar Hanegev and then split between two hotels in Tel Aviv.

However, “even though we were living quite comfortably at my daughter’s house, we still just wanted to return home,” she said. “We didn’t want to wait.”

In March 2024, after nearly six months away, she and her husband returned home.

“When we went back in March, the kibbutz was still like an army base. On the one hand, you say to yourself, ‘This is my house; why are all these people here?’ But on the other hand, you realize that this is reality, and this is what is needed right now,” Gavri said.

She added that upon returning home, there were numerous rehabilitation efforts that needed to be taken. On Oct. 7, a missile fragment pierced through her living room window, causing damage to their home.

“You return home, and all the gardens are ruined. Everything was neglected after months, and you need to rebuild and restore your house,” she said.

Gavri and her husband lived on the kibbutz for nearly six months before the rest of the community could return home in mid-August 2024. During this extended period, 17 new babies were born into the kibbutz.

“Today, over 80% of the residents have returned, and that is a lot,” she said. “There are people who need more time, people that need to process what happened, and there are people who have decided not to return, and this is very legitimate.”

The fact that terrorists didn’t infiltrate the kibbutz doesn’t mean the community didn’t endure loss, Gavri noted. One kibbutz member was murdered at the Supernova music festival.

“Some of our best friends, soulmates from Kfar Aza and Kibbutz Be’eri, were lost. This is very difficult for me, and it is heartbreaking to think of those who are not with us anymore,” she said.

“The most important asset that Israel has is its people. Nothing is more of a resource to the state than its people. But the fracture between the state and the people today is very, very large,” she added. “It sounds like a cliché, but we don’t have another country, and we have to learn from this and enact profound change to ensure a better future for our people.”

While Gavri and the vast majority of Kibbutz Nir Am have been able to return home and reacclimate, many residents of the surrounding kibbutzim have not.

RITA LIFSHITZ, a resident of Kibbutz Nir Oz, is still unable to return home.

Like Gavri, Lifshitz made aliyah with a youth movement – in her case, in 1982, during the First Lebanon War.

“We came from Sweden, which at the time was very pro-Israel, to work and volunteer in the kibbutzim,” she said. “I arrived through Greece by boat, and I fell in love with the country at first sight.”

Soon after, she decided to remain in Israel and settled in Kibbutz Nir Oz, later joining the Lifshitz family, founders of the kibbutz.  

“I found my paradise in Nir Oz but in one morning, it turned into hell,” she said.

On Oct. 6, Lifshitz was at the kibbutz’s pool with her granddaughter. They were with Keren Munder and her 9-year-old son, Ohad, who would both be kidnapped and taken hostage to Gaza one day later. That same evening, she left the kibbutz to bring her granddaughter back home and spend the holiday with her in Tel Aviv.

The next morning, Lifshitz was in the shower when her granddaughter went to get her, telling her there were sirens.

“I turned on the television to hear the news, and I see it wasn’t just missiles; I see them infiltrating the kibbutz,” she said.

Lifshitz is also a member of Tzachi. During emergencies, her role is to check in with the elderly members of the kibbutz to ensure their safety.

“All morning, I am in touch with people from the kibbutz,” she said. “I couldn’t drive down there, and I soon began receiving more and more troubling texts.”

“Please come save my sons,” was just one of the messages she received that day. “I replied to everyone that you will be okay; help will be there soon. What could I say to them?”

However, it took hours for help to arrive. On Oct. 7, Kibbutz Nir Oz was one of the hardest-hit kibbutzim. One out of every four residents was either murdered or taken hostage by Hamas. Some 80% of the homes were demolished.

“They kidnapped most of the seniors, those who founded Nir Oz,” Lifshitz said. Among them were Oded and Yocheved Lifshitz, her parents-in-law.

“Initially, I didn’t even call them on the morning of Oct. 7 because I thought they weren’t in the kibbutz,” she said. “They were supposed to be visiting friends and family in central Israel but Oded did not feel well, and they returned home the night of Oct 6.”

Only later did Lifshitz learn that Oded and Yocheved were home on the kibbutz and taken hostage by Hamas.

“Oded was shot in the hand; he was taken to Gaza. Yocheved was also kidnapped but they separated them,” she said.

Hamas released Yocheved a little over two weeks later under the pretense of a “humanitarian” gesture, while Oded has remained in Gaza to this day.

“What kept her going was knowing that me and my granddaughter were not in the kibbutz,” Lifshitz said. “It was one of the first things she asked when she was released – where are Rita and Lilu? – and if we are okay.”

In November, as part of a hostage deal, Israel secured the release of mainly elderly women and children, several from Kibbutz Nir Oz. Among them was Hannah Katzir, whose husband, Rami, had been held in captivity with Oded Lifshitz and was murdered.

“The last news we heard about Oded was in November. We know that his gunshot was tended to, but we haven’t heard anything since then,” Lifshitz said. “Yocheved is still waiting for him to return. She is strong, but she is heartbroken.”

“The grandmothers returned,” she added. “They are made from materials stronger than anything in this world. They have held together their families, their communities, and the State of Israel.”

Upon her return, Yocheved Lifshitz, as well as Katzir and other grandmothers from the kibbutz, was relocated to a home for the elderly in central Israel.

“Nothing is left – all his writings, all the photographs, all their memories of 60 years are gone, burned to the ground. Everything they had is gone,” Lifshitz said. “I am very alone. I don’t have them anymore. She is in the center; he is in Gaza. So, what can I say but that I miss them? I don’t have Saba and Savta (Grandpa and Grandma) anymore. It is a hole in my heart and an injury to my soul.”

Lifshitz said that on Fridays, she still drives down to Kibbutz Nir Oz and sits on Oded’s balcony with two cups – “one for me and one for him” – and drinks to his return.

After Oct. 7, Lifshitz and the others who had remained on the kibbutz were evacuated to the southern city of Eilat, where they lived in hotels for three months, after which they were relocated to Carmei Gat, where the kibbutz members still reside today.

“The people of Carmei Gat welcomed us very nicely and very warmly,” she said. “But to me, this place feels like an open-air prison.”

Lifshitz said that since moving to her new temporary home, where the kibbutz community is expected to remain for at least the next three years, she hasn’t been able to cook – a deep passion of hers.

“I am in post-trauma. I can’t cook, and I can’t sit still. I can’t sit for a minute and not do something,” she said.

In fact, since Oct, 7, Lifshitz has become one of the most outspoken voices of Kibbutz Nir Oz, meeting foreign dignitaries and delegations at the kibbutz and imploring them to raise awareness and help secure the release of the hostages.

She also drives to the North, offering support to residents who have been displaced due to the ongoing war with Hezbollah on the Lebanese border. “Who knows better than the people of the South what the people of the North are going through?” she said.

“We are the refugees of the people of Israel, and we will be for many more years because we cannot return home,” she said. “Still, we try to see the positive – that we didn’t have to take our belongings and move across the sea – but it is very sad to be refugees of the State of Israel.”

Lifshitz said there is growing talk of turning the kibbutz into an open-air museum – a testament to the atrocities of Oct. 7. Indeed, walking around the kibbutz, the majority of the homes and communal areas were either burned to the ground or riddled with bullet holes.

“But this is our home, and we cannot live in a museum and see the burned houses and buses with visitors,” she said. “They took me out of my home and now want to keep me out of my home. It is unreal.”

According to Lifshitz, it will take around three years to rebuild. “We have architects and plans that will hopefully be able to come to fruition. But so far, they haven’t destroyed any of the burned buildings.”

“It cannot be that Kibbutz Nir Oz won’t be on the map. I want to return home, and the hope is to return to the kibbutz and to rebuild,” she continued. “What is most amazing is that our youth also want to return and rebuild. They also want to come home.”

What is most difficult now, one year later, is coming to terms with reality, Lifshitz said.

“According to Judaism, you are in mourning for one year. We are in mourning for our loved ones and for Kibbutz Nir Oz. But after one year, we need to come to terms with this reality and ask ourselves: what do we do now? And now, it will be even more difficult, with everything gone.”

Yet of one thing Lifshitz is certain: “If Kibbutz Nir Oz isn’t on the map, if Kibbutz Nir Oz doesn’t exist, then the next line is Ashdod, Tel Aviv, and the world. If it doesn’t exist, no Jew in the world can feel safe, from New York to Sweden. If it doesn’t exist, nobody will have security. It will be very difficult for the people of Israel to exist on the map.”

She said, “We were the frontline. We are very strong. We fought to bring peace between Palestinians and Israelis, but the entire world built this terror. They didn’t see where their money was going. And now, the world needs to rebuild Nir Oz; it needs to rebuild Gaza, and it needs to build peace.”

LIFSHITZ IS not the only outspoken resident of the Gaza periphery seeking to rebuild and hoping for a brighter future.

Nira Shpak, a former colonel in the IDF and a former member of the 24th Knesset for the Yesh Atid party, is a longtime resident of Kibbutz Kfar Aza.

On Oct. 7, together with her husband and granddaughters, she entered her daughter’s bomb shelter and set up an impromptu emergency room. Israel’s Channel 13 recently aired a story on the heroism she displayed that day as she coordinated with kibbutz residents, using her contacts and knowledge of the IDF, to direct forces to assist residents in need, thereby saving countless lives.

Even after the tragic events, Shpak refused to evacuate the kibbutz, instead staying behind to help identify the bodies of her fallen neighbors. Since that day, she has become a voice for the victims and residents of the Gaza border area.

A resident of the kibbutz for more than 20 years, Shpak has lived in the Gaza periphery for nearly three decades. “Kfar Aza is my home,” she recently told the Post. “I chose to live here. This is where I’ve raised my kids and where my grandchildren are being raised.”

Yet since Oct. 7, Kibbutz Kfar Aza, one of the harder-hit kibbutzim, has been designated a “closed military area,” and its residents cannot return home.

“We are still stuck on Oct 7,” Shpak said. “We still have hostages. We are still uprooted from our homes, and we still can’t go back to Kfar Aza.”

On that tragic day, 63 members of the kibbutz were murdered, and 18 were taken hostage. Five are still held in captivity: twin brothers Ziv and Gali Berman, Doron Steinbrecher, Emily Damari, and Keith Samuel Siegel.

“I will start counting the days again when our hostages have returned home,” Shpak said. “It is difficult to talk about what happened that day. Everywhere we go, people ask: ‘Are you from Kfar Aza? How many were killed? What did you do?’ This is not the main point. It affected everyone. We were slaughtered. We were uprooted from our homes. We waited hours to be rescued, and this did not happen.”

She added, “There are so many difficult stories of people who waited to be rescued, and unfortunately, we had to bury them. We have so many people who are traumatized. I think this is a wound, if you can call it that, a wound that is open for all of us. We all have the scars, and we need to work, to share what happened, with remembrance, what we learned and what we will do for the future.”

According to Shpak, however, sharing the story of Oct 7 is not enough.

“I think about the Holocaust,” she said. “We were waiting to see who knocks on the door. Who will open it? Will death reach me and my kids and my grandchildren? I dealt with this fear for two days, but in the Holocaust, they dealt with this for years.”

“I was in the military for 26 years. I served in Gaza, and I chose to build my home on the border, and it is difficult to see where we ended up. And we all had a hand in it – the government, the army, the Knesset, and even the citizens who failed to save ourselves and demand our security.”

Now, Shpak said, she wants to look forward and rebuild the South – a difficult task, considering her community is scattered throughout the country.

For one year now, the residents of Kfar Aza have been displaced, living in a hotel in Kibbutz Shefayim in central Israel. The community is scheduled to relocate to Kibbutz Ruhama soon, where they will reside in temporary housing until they can return home.

“Who knows when we will return? It will likely take at least two or three years before we can go home,” Shpak said.

“The most important thing is to stay alive, and then shelter and food – the necessities – and then you look left and right and ask: What is the next step? How do you wake up in the morning? For most of us, who still live in a hotel, we don’t have a kitchen; we don’t have a living room. The basic things that most free people have and is so natural, we don’t have.”

Yet she remains hopeful.

“I see hope. For me, hope still lives, and we need to fight to be an am hofshi be’artzenu – a free people in our Land. And the day will come when I can return to my home and raise my children and let my grandson ride his bike around the garden without worrying about terrorists,” she said.

To ensure this future, Shpak aims to return to political life and is running to be the head of the Sha’ar HaNegev Regional Council. The former head, Ofir Libstein, was murdered on Oct. 7 while defending Kfar Aza.

“We need to bring what is needed for our communities and for the next generation, from agriculture to education to security to culture to health and welfare,” she said. “We need to show the resilience of the State of Israel so that the next generations will choose to build their homes here and live how we dreamed of in the Negev, as David Ben-Gurion envisioned.

“After the Holocaust, the State of Israel was established. After Oct 7, what will be established? This is the most important question.”