Community members, both current and former, were in Israel when Hamas terrorists brutally murdered and kidnapped Israeli citizens on Oct. 7.
The Chronicle received the following firsthand accounts from current or past community members who were in Israel during the Oct. 7 attacks. Though edited for clarity, length and grammar, the words, accounts and sentiments of the following stories are the authors’.
Erik Claster
Erik Claster, a Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy graduate who grew up in Overland Park, Kansas, now lives in Efrat, Israel, with his family. He is raising money for gear and financial assistance for soldiers and can be reached at for more information on how to donate.
I am 43 years old, married to Lia Claster and a proud father of eight children. I grew up in Overland Park, Kansas, and made aliyah in August of 1999.
My immediate family is okay — the children are partly back in school and afterschool activities (but have anxiety over the sirens and rockets which we do get here, albeit far less than in major population centers). I unfortunately have not been able to see them much since this all started on Oct 7.
I work in the high-tech industry here in Israel and, among other things, I’m the founder of B.S.I., an independent Boy and Girl Scouting organization.
I served in the Israel Defense Force’s Givati infantry combat brigade from 2001 to 2004 as a machine gunner (“Negev”) and later as a staff sergeant for my unit. I spent all three of my mandatory service years in the Gaza Strip (Gush Katif), protecting the Israeli citizens living there from the terror groups trying daily to destroy them and the State of Israel (much like what transpired on Oct. 7). After my discharge from mandatory service in 2004, I served in reserves as a staff sergeant under the Northern Command, safeguarding communities from Hezbollah and other factions on Israel’s northern borders with Lebanon and Syria until 2022.
For the past five years, I’ve been a member of my town, Efrat’s, “rapid response tactical team” and continue to serve in active reserves to this day.
On Oct. 7, my family and I were awakened by air raid sirens and had to seek shelter from rocket attacks from Gaza. Immediately following this, I received “the call,” effectively activating me for emergency reserve duty — Israel was under attack again, another war.
There’s no need to dwell on the magnitude of our enemies’ attack and the irreversible damage they have inflicted upon us. There’s no need to debate or speculate about the “why,” “how,” or “who” is to blame. There’s no time for all of that now. We are once again fighting for our lives and the survival of this complex, diverse, and imperfect country of ours — the State of Israel.
Like myself, my “brothers in arms” have left their homes, families, and jobs without question to restore security and peace to our citizens. We have been doing this since and will continue as long as God (and the government) allows us this privilege.
We are fighting for Israel, we are fighting for Jewish people wherever they may be. This is “the promise of 2,000 years,” and this is still our promise to all.
We are fighting for [the Kansas City Jewish community] just as much as we are fighting for ourselves. This is the way I have always seen it and the primary reason I felt compelled to move [to Israel] after high school and serve in the IDF to begin with. It’s our people’s first army in thousands of years, and it serves us all.
Michael Firestone
Michael Firestone is a graduate of Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy’s Class of 1973 and works with groups who come to Israel to help them learn about the land. This is an edited message from Michael Firestone to participants of an outdoor Sukkot program that he led in Tzfat.
[On the afternoon of Oct. 7], my reserve unit was mobilized, as so many other reserve forces were. We showed up at our base, got our gear as quickly as possible. [There were] lots of hugs, lots of disbelief, and within a few hours, we were on our way.
[As of writing], we are in a forest near the border, holding a strategic position, doing some training, getting our gear in the best shape possible, guarding ourselves at night, hearing military updates by various commanders, and most importantly, getting to know each other better. Not just names, but lives… DMCs are a part of service (Deep Meaningful Conversations).
Soon, we’ll be given a mission, and we will get it done. It’s true that I’m pretty old for army service, but there are a few things that if you’re good at, you can be helpful to your team. One — being okay with the “Great Unknown” and going with the flow. Two — enjoying living in the great outdoors, without showers or a change of clothes. Three — carrying heavy backpacks on your shoulders. Four — keeping your calm in stressful situations. Five — working well with others, and helping those in need.
In almost every conversation between us, there is one subject that keeps coming up. It is perhaps one of the most important subjects in the world. But it is not taught in universities, not reported on in the news, not the subject of many books and movies, and not a big theme in social media.
It’s about living a life of love versus living a life of hate. Love versus hate.
…I really and truly believe that this is what it comes down to. And everybody I’m talking to in the army is mentioning the same thing. If you’ve been following trustworthy media, you know exactly what I’m talking about. This (and previous wars) are not just battles with bullets and bombs. It is a battle of light versus darkness.
Terrible things happened on that Shabbat. And more terrible things will yet happen. One of the biggest challenges for Israel will be destroying terrorist infrastructure while keeping our ethical soul intact. And this will be at a time that terrorists will be hiding behind civilians, under hospitals, in schools and in private homes, with an actual wish that the IDF will hurt their own civilians for PR gains. And some civilians will be actual terrorists. I hope you realize how hard it will be to discern between the guilty and the innocent. If we are too mean, we lose ethically. If we are too nice, we lose more lives. (And you know one thing for sure: the world and the world’s media and the world’s institutions will vilify Israel, no matter what we’ll do.) It is a lose-lose situation, but it must be done.
But we must live and act in the way we feel is ethical, even if we are censured by the entire world. This is no small challenge.
We are living at a time when world events change our world view. What happened on Shabbat is one of those events.
Joel Gutovitz
Dr. Joel Gutovitz, a Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy and University of Kansas graduate, is now an intern physician at Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, Israel. The following are excerpts from an interview he did for Sheba.
On Oct. 7, I was celebrating Simchat Torah, a happy holiday — Shabbat, also. We got a call that Sheba [Medical Center] needed extra help transferring patients from the helicopters into the ER.
Immediately, we heard the call. Usually we don’t drive on Shabbat, we don’t usually have access to our phones, but we jumped into the car and hurried over here. It was kind of a shock to see how serious the situation was; we weren’t fully updated on what had happened in the south. So to come to be the first people seeing those patients, transferring them out of the helicopters and helping them get into the ER, was really shocking.
I’m from Kansas. In Kansas, we don’t see these things. In Israel, we also shouldn’t see these things. [These are] just totally different cases from what I’m used to.
…Those first few days, everyone kind of had to be flexible, to be prepared to help out in orthopedics or neurosurgery. Everyday when I finish here in internal medicine, there are soldiers around the hospital, there are patients who are injured in the south around the hospital, and I try to make my rounds. I’ve gotten to know some of those families, so I’ve spent a little bit of time with them as well — really amazing, inspiring families.
For example, yesterday somebody showed me a piece of shrapnel — his phone was in his pocket, and the shrapnel was caught by his phone. He just found his phone the other day. It’s quite possible that it prevented serious damage to his femoral artery and possibly saved his life. Everyday we’re hearing more and more miraculous stories from patients, miraculous stories from doctors and people involved.
I’ll say the most beautiful thing is seeing the unity that’s come about in these really, really hard times. It’s definitely challenging, gut wrenching, heartbreaking, what’s happened to all of the victims and everyone involved, but to see everyone coming together… Since Oct. 7, people have been asking, “Where can I go to donate blood? Where are there soldiers where I can take chocolate or home baked goods or pizzas?” It’s really been beautiful to see the unity that’s come out of it.
…One other thing that’s changed has been some people — a lot of people and doctors — have been called up to reserve duty. So in our intern group chat, people are always asking, “Hey, I’ve been called up to the military. Who can take my shift?” Before this month, to get someone to take one of your night shifts [was] impossible — no chance. But ever since, people are really jumping on board taking on extra shifts, eager and willing to help each other, however we can. And that’s the spirit of Israel.
Dan and Melynn Sight
Dan and Melynn Sight of Leawood, Kansas, were in Israel as tourists on Oct. 7. The following was submitted by Dan Sight.
After 41 years of marriage, Melynn finally convinced me to go to Israel.
When we got off our cruise ship early, we headed from Ashdod (which was the area of some of the first Hamas attacks) and headed to Tel Aviv. What I witnessed was a bustling modern city… Our hotel was extremely busy with lots of families and kids celebrating the upcoming holiday, Simchat Torah, the celebratory day of rewinding the Torah to the beginning.
On Oct. 7, our friends Dikla and Nadav took us for a walk on the beach in Haifa. It was a glorious day. I was jealous that they could go to a beach anytime within five minutes, where we in Kansas City could not live farther away from a beach. Then it all started.
We walked by open cafes with people just starting their weekend, but as we walked back on the beach, those same cafes were closing. Our friend asked a worker what was happening, and they said there had been an attack and they had been asked to close and everyone go home. We proceeded to go back to the house and watch the start of this war unfold, live, up close, just as other families across Israel did. It was eight hours earlier back home.
We sent a WhatsApp note to our kids to let them know we were safe (hopefully) and not to panic when they saw the news when they woke up. Were we scared, frightened, nervous? Hell yes. Although we never discussed it, I was not sure we would see our kids or family or friends again.
Our friends and we were glued to their Israeli TV station (like CNN) as all the reports started coming in. They would give us updates, as the reports were all in Hebrew, and we used our phones to translate their headlines. The real-time stories and photographs were horrific and unbelievable — pictures that I never want to discuss with anyone and ones that will be forever embedded in my brain and consciousness.
Our friends’ home was equipped with a safe room, steel doors and bars on the windows.
Haifa, fortunately, was quiet from the bombings. The streets around our friends’ house were eerily quiet. We did a walk around the neighborhood where the only noise was children playing on a playground as their parents looked on. I could see and feel the fear in their faces.
That night in bed, and for the next three nights we were there, we heard the constant roar of Israeli jet fighters going overhead. Mountains that we saw just the day before held an incredible amount of terror and bombs that could have easily reached our area, just 15 miles away.
Also, that first night, our flight back to the US was canceled. I stayed up that night trying to figure a way home. After Delta canceled another flight, I read that El Al airlines had missile defense systems on board and that they rarely cancel flights. I was able to get us tickets to Barcelona, Spain, that Tuesday.
On Monday night, Melynn and I felt like we needed to do something, and that something was to make an “American dinner” for them and their family. We were able to walk to a store and get chicken, corn, and ingredients for making Kansas City BBQ sauce. It was so cathartic to us both to be able to do this.
The next day, Nadav put us on the train from Haifa to the Tel Aviv airport. As we sat in our seats, we looked to the right and saw a young female soldier, heading in for active duty. We could see the fear and concern in her face. We imagined our nephew who is the same age going to war instead of the University of Kansas.
When we got to the airport, it was clearly a madhouse. Our plane came in 1.5 hours late and 2.5 hours after we were supposed to board. Once we were boarded, we stayed on the runway for over an hour, wondering if we were going to take off. We finally did, Melynn and I held hands, hugged and cried.
It is a shame that people just cannot be people. All we all want is to live a good life, a meaningful life, to have joy and to be loved. Sadly, it seems that over history this is an impossibility. Hamas wants to kill all the Jewish people. They will do this at the expense of their own people, the Palestinians. There is no good outcome to what has just happened. Lives, families, and dreams have all been changed.
I am sad for Israel and all its people and visitors. Many, many people go there for “their” religion, and they may not be able to do that for a long time.
I have incredible admiration for the Israeli people, for the soldiers that are coming back from the US and elsewhere to fight this war against evil. Israel is their homeland, they don’t think twice about going back.
