Posted on January 3, 2025
“That terrible day is not over yet…”
My name is Lee Amram-Eilat, Amitim 2011. I am a PhD candidate in International Relations at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a former radio news editor and anchor at Kol Israel, Kan Reshet Bet (the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation).
Reporting Live on October 7th
On October 7, 2023, at 06:35, I ran from the newsroom into the radio studio and turned on the microphone. Nothing was known yet, except that for six continuous minutes sirens had been blaring across nearly half of the country.
A deep breath. A siren interrupts the broadcast. Then another. And another. I try to make sense of the situation, simultaneously texting with reporters and editing the broadcast while on the air, and working alongside the sound technician, who also had to function as producer. Trying to understand what is happening. Trying to convey what is happening. Trying to stay calm, composed and responsible.
An hour and fifteen minutes of continuous broadcast, during which initial reports come in about infiltrators in the Israeli kibbutzim and cities bordering the Gaza strip. Should I trust this video showing terrorists in pickup trucks in Sderot? An interview with a resident of Kibbutz Kfar Azza, about an hour into the events. She says she can hear not only the rockets firing from Gaza but also gunfire outside her domestic shelter. None of us can fathom what is happening and what is yet to come.
It Isn’t Over Yet
Six months have passed since I stopped working in the media. Since then, every investigation and story published has become deeply personal. Theories say there is always a gap between what’s happening and what’s reported in real time — the fog of war, the lack of answers. But in the end, when I think about that inevitable gap, I also have my own self-examination to contend with.
As the unfiltered brutality of the sheer atrocities committed by Hamas and civilians from Gaza has been revealed, I fully understand what happened, but I still can’t process it. These horrors seem unrelated even to the violent conflict we thought we knew, as if they were taken from other dark times and places in history. If you doubt that these events occurred, watch what Hamas aired live on social media or recorded with their GoPros.
That terrible day is not over yet, even a year and two months later. One hundred of my brothers and sisters — babies, men, the elderly, women, soldiers, and civilians — are still being held captive in Gaza. New fronts have opened since then; some have closed, others remain active. Just last night, people in Tel Aviv-Jaffa were injured by the collateral damage of a ballistic missile launched by the Houthis in Yemen.
The destruction and the fracture, both within us and outside, hardly provide a solid foundation for rebuilding and recovery. Yet, it’s clear that we must begin. While some resist, many more simply don’t know where to start. After all, what has ever truly worked before? And what could possibly work now?
