Choosing life, building hope: Former hostage turns to disability advocacy to honor wife, daughters

Eli Sharabi, a former Hamas hostage freed after 491 days, partners with Shalva to establish the Shalva Sharabi Family Center in Ashkelon, offering disability services and trauma care for 28 Gaza border communities. The center honors his wife Lianne and daughters Noiya and Yahel, murdered on Oct. 7, 2023. Sharabi, who lost 30 kilos in captivity and learned of their deaths upon release, has since become a prominent advocate for hostages, addressing the UN Security Council and publishing a memoir. The center includes a Horizons Pavilion for trauma recovery.

Eli Sharabi, a former resident of Kibbutz Be'eri who was taken hostage by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, and freed after 491 days in captivity, has partnered with Shalva, the Israel Association for the Care and Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities, to create a new center in Ashkelon. The Shalva Sharabi Family Center will provide diagnostic services, therapy, rehabilitation, and trauma care for 28 Gaza border communities. Sharabi's wife Lianne, 48, and daughters Noiya, 16, and Yahel, 13, were murdered by Hamas terrorists in their home on Oct. 7. Sharabi, who lost 30 kilos during captivity and weighed just 44 kilos upon release, learned of their deaths only after returning to Israel. He became a prominent advocate for remaining hostages, met with world leaders, addressed the UN Security Council, and published a memoir, Hostage. The center, located near the Ashkelon Marina, will include a Horizons Pavilion focused on trauma recovery for children, adults, soldiers, first responders, and families affected by the Oct. 7 attacks and the subsequent war. Sharabi's connection to Shalva predates the attack: he visited the organization's Jerusalem campus in 2017 and had planned to bring his family there. The article is a feature profile, reporting Sharabi's story and the center's mission without overt manipulation techniques.