Noa Reuveni, a 25-year-old from Tel Aviv, is drawing attention with her harrowing account of her twin Israeli brothers, Ziv and Gali Berman, who were kidnapped from their apartment on October 7, 2023, during the Hamas terrorist invasion. The attack, which began in the early morning hours, saw Hamas unleash a brutal assault on innocent Israeli civilians. The Berman brothers’ apartment building was set ablaze, and they were taken captive.
“We have an unspoken rule: whenever there are sirens at either of our places, we text each other, and he asks me if I’m OK, and I ask him the same,” Reuveni shared in a phone interview.
Near the Gaza-Israel border, Hamas perpetrated war crimes, killing Israeli men, women, and children on the first day of the Israel-Hamas war, marking the deadliest attack on Jews since the Holocaust.
At the time of the invasion, Reuveni was in California when she received a phone alert about missile strikes. Immediately, she texted Ziv, her close friend, to ensure his safety.
For over 40 minutes, Reuveni received no response.
“The first thing he said to me was, ‘I’m scared to death,’” she recalled.
Reuveni explained that sirens were a regular occurrence in Israel.
“We’re not afraid of them anymore,” she said.
Shortly after 7 a.m., Ziv texted Reuveni, stating he could hear Arabic being spoken outside. He barricaded himself and stayed silent until 9:45 a.m. During this time, Reuveni said he sent over 20 text messages expressing his fear and inability to remain calm.
“I tried to tell him that I’m taking care of it. I’m getting help for him,” she said.
Unable to reach the Israeli police, Reuveni reassured Ziv that help was on its way.
“I couldn’t get a hold of anybody,” she said. “I was very, very helpless. He was basically begging for help.”
Unprepared for the magnitude of the surprise attack by Iran-backed terrorists, Reuveni said kidnapping was an unimaginable thought that she hadn’t considered.
“At 9:45, I received my last message from him, which was ‘I’m scared,'” Reuveni said. “That was the last time that I’d heard from him.”
Reuveni’s final message to Ziv was a comforting, “I’m with you,” before his phone went silent indefinitely.
During a temporary truce between Israel and Hamas, from November 24, 2023, to November 30, 2023, over 100 hostages were released by Hamas. Although neither brother was among them, Reuveni shared that the only sign of life she and the twins’ family received was from released hostages who said they had seen the siblings in Gaza tunnels, “separately, unfortunately.”
“Ever since October 7, I left my life. I left college. I left my job,” Reuveni said. “I left everything I had in my life out of the realization that now my friends need me and my loved ones need me, and I can’t do anything else. Nothing else matters more than this.”
Reuveni moved from her village in Israel, Shahar, to Tel Aviv to be close to Hostages Square, where she urges Israeli citizens to talk about the hostages and share their stories.
“Sometimes I speak seven days a week, sometimes six times back-to-back,” she said. “I don’t regret it for a single second.”
Today, Reuveni is speaking in Cleveland, Ohio, after having spoken in Chicago, which she left due to the security concerns surrounding the Democratic National Convention (DNC).
“All Jews actually told me to leave,” she said. “They all told me that I shouldn’t be there during that time because it will get hectic and crazy. I thought that was just crazy for me to hear that Jews are leaving town. They’re leaving the city because of the DNC.”
Buses of protesters swarmed the streets outside the four-day 2024 DNC and breached police barricades to oppose the Democrats’ support for the Israeli military and their fight against Hamas.
“I think that the best thing that people around the world, Jews around the world, can do right now is get together, is not give the bully what they want, is not go into hiding and not surrender to that fear and the violence that they’re projecting but instead be proud of who they are,” Reuveni said.
New York City and Long Island are next on Reuveni’s speaking tour before she returns to Israel. As the one-year anniversary of the devastating attacks approaches in October, Reuveni will return to the United States for four weeks to continue her mission.
“We need to continuously raise awareness and make sure we never stop talking about them because the day we stop talking about them is the day that we’re giving up on them,” she said.
Reuveni described Ziv and Gali as “loyal” and “best friends.” She added that friendship and family mean everything to them.
“They have so much respect and admiration for their mother,” she said. “I always say I have never heard a man in my life speak about their mother with so much respect like I’ve heard them speak about theirs.”
In the over 300 days since the unprovoked attacks, Reuveni hopes the brothers have found their way back to one another.
“They have never been apart,” she said. “They have this twin power.”
Today, over 1,000 Israelis are still believed to be held captive in Gaza, according to Reuters.