On October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks caused the death of 1,200 people while 251 were taken hostage. A year later, 97 people still detained in the Gaza Stripincluding 33 declared dead, according to the Israeli army. Olivier Jaoui, founder of the association “Broken Lives – October 7”, parent of Ofer Calderon, one of the two French hostages still held by Hamas, lost several members of his family that day. “I lost my cousin, who should have been 80 years old, and her 12 year old granddaughter, he explains. We know today that they were machine-gunned in their shelter, after which their bodies were burned in the desire to destroy them as much as possible. Things lift us up today with these commemorations, but they are necessary.”
He remembers precisely the moment when he understood that something serious was happening in Israel, thanks to a message from a cousin present there. “I remember a rather incredible sentence, from an Israeli cousin, who told us verbatim: ‘We have good news, we saw Erez on a video being taken to Gaza’, explains Olivier Jaoui. The good news is that it seems that he is not dead and I have this sentence in my head.”
The difficulty of rebuilding oneself
Erez, who was 12 years old on October 7, 2023, is the son of Ofer Calderon, they were held by Hamas in Gaza and with his sister Sahar, aged 16. The children are still waiting for their father to return and since their release, they have been depressed. “They saw and experienced terrible things, said Olivier Jaoui. They saw their house burned, corpses and witnessed the rape of Erez’s former nanny. When they returned from Gaza, they discovered the death of their grandmother, the death of their cousin, the fact that their village had burned. I think anyone, regardless of age, would have a hard time getting over what happened to them.”
Oliver Jaoui also expresses his sorrow for the tens of thousands of civilians who have died in Gaza since the start of the war. “What is happening today in Gaza is appalling for Gazans. Unfortunately, we must not forget that the trigger was October 7. The famous tunnels were never opened to civilians, so yes, there is obviously suffering that I find absolutely terrible for the Gazans.”