First sign of life after 492 days: Family of kidnapped Israeli Alon Ohel receives word from released hostage

The family of Alon Ohel, who was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists at the Nova musical festival party at Kibbutz Re’im on Oct. 7, 2023, announced that they had received the first sign of life from him through one of the recently released Israeli hostages.

“After 492 days of uncertainty, we received our first sign of life today – our Alon is alive. He is injured and not receiving treatment,” the Ohel family stated.

“Since he was abducted, Alon has been held in difficult conditions in Hamas’ underground tunnels, without daylight and without access to basic human conditions. We were informed that Alon has an eye injury.”

“In addition, Alon is being held in particularly difficult conditions of captivity, with a severe shortage of food,” the family stated.

“We learned today that since his kidnapping, Alon has been held in the Gaza tunnels along with recently released hostages.”

Following their release on Saturday, Israeli media outlets reported that the horrible medical condition of Or Levy, Ohad Ben Ami and Eli Sharabi was partly due to them being held underground for most of their captivity."

On Sunday, Hamas published a propaganda video showing Levy, Ben Ami and Sharabi sitting in a small room in a concrete tunnel when they were told they would be released.

The Ohel family further stated they are “happy and excited to know that he is alive, but we are also devastated and shocked by the physical and mental state he is in, and the abuse he and the other hostages are still going through.”

They also called on the government to move up the second phase of the hostage deal to return all of the hostages as soon as possible.

Under the terms of the current first stage of the hostage deal, only 33 hostages, mainly female civilians and soldiers, as well as elderly or sick men, are set to be released.

The Ohel family added it would celebrate Alon’s 24th birthday in Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square on Monday.

On the morning of Oct. 7, Ohel went to the Nova festival to celebrate with a group of his friends, arriving only an hour before the Hamas invasion began.

He and his friends sought shelter in a field bunker, which later became known as the “bunker of death,” after 16 Israelis were murdered there, including Aner Shapira, who gave his life while attempting to save the others seeking shelter.

Seven of them survived by hiding under the growing pile of bodies for some six hours before being rescued.

Four others were kidnapped from there: Ohel, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Or Levy, and Eliya Cohen.

According to an article in The Free Press, written by his mother Idit, Ohel is a music lover and a talented pianist, who received an acceptance letter to the Rimon School of Music.

Since his kidnapping, Ohel's family has blasted music in the direction of the Gaza Strip, hoping he or the other hostages would hear it.

They also brought a yellow-painted piano to Hostage Square in Tel Aviv, and several similar pianos were erected in his honor around the world.

“Alon is just a beautiful person, always smiling, always trying to be helpful and he’s a people person, you know, everyone who meets him [says he] is really easy to talk to and he has many, many friends,” Idit told The Media Line.

Ohel's other passions include cars, which his mother says “he’s been obsessed with since he was two years old,” as well as cooking and surfing.

The last time the family saw Ohel was when they viewed video footage from Oct. 7 that was released weeks later. The video showed a Hamas terrorist dragging Ohel by his hair toward a white pickup, before he was shoved onto the vehicle and beaten.

The IDF later confirmed that Ohel had been abducted into Gaza as a hostage, but for the last 492 days, there had been no sign of life to confirm it.