Omer Shem Tov responds to 'BDA' filmmakers: 'For 505 days, I was 'collateral damage''

Held hostage by Hamas for 505 days, Omer Shem Tov writes in a Wall Street Journal op-ed responding to the documentary 'BDA' (Collateral Damage), stating that during his captivity he himself was 'collateral damage' — fearing both his captors and IDF strikes. He describes how Hamas left him to die while the IDF warned his fellow hostage's mother of an impending attack, and criticizes the film for omitting the October 7 massacre.

Omer Shem Tov, a hostage survivor who was kidnapped from the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, and held in Gaza for 505 days, published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in response to the documentary 'BDA' (Collateral Damage), which won a special award at the Venice Film Festival. Shem Tov writes that throughout his captivity, he himself was 'collateral damage' — fearing both his armed captors and Israeli Air Force strikes. He describes an incident where his captors fled and left him behind in anticipation of an Israeli attack, while the IDF called the mother of one of his fellow hostages to warn her to leave her home. 'There I was — kidnapped, starved, and tortured by her son — while my army tried to keep his mother alive,' he writes. Shem Tov notes that the ratio of casualties in Gaza, according to military and American estimates, stands at 1.5 to 2 civilians per combatant — relatively low for urban warfare of this intensity. He criticizes the film for omitting the October 7 massacre and the hostage-taking, and writes that the applause in Venice felt to him 'like a shower of knives.' He concludes with a call for moral clarity: 'We have the right to ensure there is no more October 7. And we should not be ashamed of that.'