On a transparent December morning, two Palestinian brothers stood on a mound in southern Israel that neglected Gaza, watching smoke rise after Israeli airstrikes.
It was a conflicted second for the lads, Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar, 37, and Mahmood Abu Amar, 24. They reside in Israel, in East Jerusalem, and have been pondering of their relations in Hamas-controlled Gaza, whom they’d not heard from in weeks.
However the brothers had been drawn to the Gaza border for an additional motive: Their youngest brother, Soheib Abu Amar, a bus driver, was captured by Hamas on Oct. 7, taken after he drove Israeli partygoers to a music competition the night time earlier than.
His brothers had come to retrace Mr. Abu Amar’s final recognized steps.
Some two million Arabs reside in Israel, roughly a fifth of the nation’s inhabitants of greater than 9 million. A number of have been among the many 1,200 individuals killed by Hamas on Oct 7.
For Mr. Abu Amar’s brothers, the times since his abduction have been full of bewildering feelings. As Palestinians, their hearts are with Gazans struggling below the unrelenting Israeli bombardment. However Mr. Abu Amar’s killing has additionally made them share in Israel’s trauma.
“The lack of so many civilians — right here and there — is unbearably painful,” Mahmood Abu Amar stated.
Hours earlier than the assault, Mr. Abu Amar slept in his new minibus, and deliberate to drive his passengers house within the morning, his household stated.
As an alternative he was caught up in Hamas’s assault.
After the assault started, he despatched footage and movies to his household, and up to date them on his whereabouts. He known as Mahmood to debate what to do.
“I informed him to go away, however he didn’t need to go with out his passengers,” Mahmood Abu Amar stated.
“By the point I satisfied him to flee, a policeman ordered him to remain put till the barrage was over,” Mahmood Abu Amar stated.
As rockets flew overhead, hundreds of Hamas terrorists launched into a lethal rampage by means of Israeli border communities. The rave was the positioning of their deadliest bloodbath. Some 360 individuals have been slaughtered, and scores extra have been kidnapped.
Mr. Abu Amar tried to drive partygoers from the bloodbath, in response to sprint cam footage recovered by the police from his minibus. The footage was later given to his household.
“There are terrorists right here,” he stated to his passengers.
“What? Terrorists, proper right here?” a passenger replied.
Video filmed by a Hamas fighter exhibits Mr. Abu Amar being led by means of the rave web site by an attacker in fight garments.
One other attacker approached Mr. Abu Amar, the video confirmed. “Are you Arab?” he shouted. Mr. Abu Amar tells the attacker he’s a bus driver from Jerusalem.
At 9:32 a.m., Mr. Abu Amar’s brother-in-law acquired a name from Mr. Abu Amar’s telephone.
It was a Hamas attacker who had captured Mr. Abu Amar.
“I informed him, ‘Go away him,’” stated the brother-in-law, who requested to stay nameless to guard his household from reprisals. “‘He’s my brother. Let him go to his home; his mom is ready for him. He’s from Jerusalem, not from there,’” which means Israel.
The Hamas terrorist replied, “‘I’m not leaving him, I’m maintaining him with me.’”
Hoping to rescue his brother, Mahmood Abu Amar rushed south.
By 11 a.m., he was lower than 20 minutes from the place his brother was being held, however troopers closed off the realm, he stated. He waited at a fuel station however, sensing suspicious glances, drove again to Jerusalem.
At 3 p.m., Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar acquired a name from an unfamiliar quantity.
It was Mr. Abu Amar.
Utilizing a fellow hostage’s telephone, Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar stated his brother defined that he was being held with others.
“He spoke a couple of negotiation with Israeli forces, which he was hopeful would yield his launch,” he stated. “He requested me to not point out something to our dad and mom in order that they wouldn’t fear.”
It was the final time the household spoke with Mr. Abu Amar.
Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar desires to know why Hamas focused his brother. “In the event that they knew he was Arab,” he stated, “why didn’t they let him go?”
To report his brother lacking, Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar went to a police station in Jerusalem, which is commonly a fraught expertise for Palestinians in Israel. The primary officer he met — an Arab citizen of Israel — reacted aggressively, he stated. “‘Go knock on Hamas’s door for assist,’” he recalled the officer saying. A Jewish policewoman defused the scenario and assisted him.
Just a few days later, the police took DNA samples from the brothers’ dad and mom. On Oct. 18, the household acquired the information they’d feared: Mr. Abu Amar was lifeless.
However they nonetheless don’t understand how, when or the place he died.
A reporter for The New York Instances discovered that the telephone Mr. Abu Amar had used on Oct. 7 belonged to a 68-year-old girl from Be’eri, an Israeli village two miles from the competition web site.
That revelation didn’t initially make sense to Mr. Abu Amar’s household. How did he find yourself with a resident from Be’eri?
A televised interview with a competition survivor supplied a clue. The survivor, Yasmin Porat, stated she was taken by Hamas terrorists right into a home in Be’eri with 13 different hostages. She talked about {that a} Palestinian from Jerusalem had helped translate a dialog between the hostages and the terrorists.
She had assumed he was a terrorist.
When a Instances reporter confirmed Mr. Abu Amar’s picture to Ms. Porat, she realized the reality. Mr. Abu Amar had been the translator.
His destiny grew to become clearer: He’d been kidnapped to Be’eri and detained with a bunch of captured residents, as terrorists massacred individuals in different elements of the village.
On that December morning, the brothers visited the situation the place Mr. Abu Amar had photographed the minibus on Oct. 7.
They went to Be’eri to see the house the place he was held hostage. Mahmood Abu Amar examined its bullet-charred partitions.
Not lengthy after Mr. Abu Amar spoke to his household for the final time, Israeli safety forces engaged in an intense battle with Hamas terrorists on the house, in response to interviews and video from the scene. The entire hostages, aside from Ms. Porat and one other girl, have been killed in the course of the firefights.
Mahmood Abu Amar stated he’s “offended with each side.”
“Individuals ask me who killed him,” he stated, “however I don’t understand how he died. I made a decision to come back right here to attempt to discover out, hoping that if I do know extra about his final moments, the ache will ease.”
Eran Betito, a Be’eri resident who took the brothers to the home, informed them his coronary heart went out to them. He stated he additionally misplaced relations and associates on Oct. 7.
Households of the hostages, who need an investigation to start instantly, have written a letter to officers in Be’eri, asking that the house not be demolished till the navy and the police have carried out an inquiry.
“We wish peace,” Mr. Betito stated. “We’re held hostage by warmongering extremists.”
Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar nodded and stated that he, too, shares the kibbutz’s ache.
“We work with Israelis, we now have Israeli associates which might be like household to us, we all know that we will get alongside,” Abd Al-Mughani Abu Amar stated.
“This conflict will finish sometime when two leaders comply with shake fingers,” he added. “However our sorrow, our ache, won’t ever heal.”
