I can’t stop thinking about Liri Albag.
She spent 477 days in Hamas captivity. Every one of them was a nightmare. She returned home gaunt, exhausted, and forever changed. And when she opened her mouth – not to shout, not to blame blindly, but to speak her truth – some of us couldn’t handle it. Not just disagreement. Cruelty. Body-shaming. Death wishes.
“I’m reading the threats and curses I received, and I’m afraid,” she wrote. “Not afraid of the responses themselves… I’m afraid of what we’ve become.”
And she’s right to be afraid. Liri said the prime minister is responsible for the failure of October 7. She also said, clearly and unequivocally, that Hamas is the enemy – and still, the online mob came for her.
“Make fun of my weight? Reminds me of the terrorists who shouted at me and made sure to remind me daily that I’m fat.”
“Wish someone would be in captivity? I wouldn’t wish that upon my haters.”
Let that sink in. A young woman survives unspeakable horrors, comes home, and is met not with silence or support but with a digital lynching.
And it’s not just Liri.
Noa Argamani also faced public backlash
Noa Argamani’s image became a symbol of October 7. Her screams were heard across the world. She was abducted on the back of a motorcycle and held for 245 days.
She was freed in an incredible military operation. When she flew with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Washington, to advocate for the release of those still in Gaza – including her boyfriend – she, too, became a target. Not from the Right this time but from the Left.
Veteran journalists publicly shamed her and her father, saying they should “be ashamed until their last day” for participating in what they saw as political theater. And all I could think was: Since when do we shame survivors for how they survive?
Noa was trying, in her own way, to make sense of the world she came back to – and maybe to bring others home. That deserves respect, not ridicule.
This isn’t about politics. It’s not about Netanyahu. It’s not about whether you support this government or want it gone tomorrow. It’s about how we treat people who’ve been through hell.
There’s a difference between public discourse and personal attacks. Between critique and cruelty. Between asking hard questions and hurling venom.
It’s too easy to claim that freed hostages are being “used” politically. Maybe they are, maybe they’re not. But the moment we take away their agency – their right to speak, to act, to feel – we’re not protecting them from politics. We’re silencing them. And worse, we’re retraumatizing them.
People don’t come back from Gaza whole. They come back fragmented. They need time. They need care. They need space to breathe, to cry, to scream, to recover.
And yes, they might say things we’re not ready to hear. They might criticize leaders we support. They might show up in places we don’t expect. But our job is not to judge every word. Our job, as a society, is to hold them – not break them.
There will be time for questions, for commissions, for accountability, for real debate. But right now? Right now, we need to stop weaponizing survivors to serve our political views – and stop punishing them when they don’t align.
Liri said it best: “This rift is worse than our enemies. We can’t win like this!! … Let’s fight our enemies and not one another.”
Let’s not fail them twice.
The writer is executive director of ICAR Collective, bringing together leading experts in medicine, psychology, public health, philanthropy, and investment, to accelerate trauma healing to safeguard the health, productivity, and security of Israel.