On December 10, 2023, 29-year-old Yotam Haim, of Kfar Aza, who had survived 42 days in Hamas captivity since Oct. 7, escaped from his captors, along with two other hostages – Alon Shamriz and Samer Talalka. The trio survived for five days by hiding in abandoned houses in the Shejaia neighborhood of Gaza City. Five days later, on December 15, they were killed by IDF troops, who mistook them for Hamas terrorists.
“It would have been easier for me to succumb to despair and visit his grave every day,” says Iris Haim, Yotam’s mother, who spoke with this writer recently over Zoom. “I could sit at home and be angry at the army that killed my son, and the government that abandoned me on Oct. 7, but that was not an option for me.”
After Yotam’s tragic death, Haim became famous for her graciousness in forgiving the soldiers who had mistakenly shot her son. During the shiva period of mourning, she recorded a message of comfort and forgiveness to the soldiers who had mistaken her son and the others for terrorists. She has since spoken at numerous venues across the country, delivering her message of consolation and a call to remain united.
Two-and-a-half years since her son’s death, Iris is actively engaged in the development of a project that is directly tied to the essence of her son – Beit Yotam, a center for mental health and trauma recovery that is planned for the Gaza border area. The center, she explains, will be built on the same foundations that strengthened Yotam throughout his life – family support, music, sports, and animals.
“First and foremost, it’s about supporting the family,” says Haim. “The family is the most important anchor in the life of a person facing difficulties. Through conversations with many families, I’ve seen the challenges they face – the shame, the tendency to hide what they’re going through, and the lack of communication that can develop between family members.
“With Yotam, we built a strong support network around him, and it helped him tremendously. That is the foundation of Beit Yotam. Before anything else, it will serve as a resilience center for families, providing them with the support, guidance, and tools they need to cope with these challenges together.”
Second is the person himself. Sports, music, and animals are all important tools for helping people, she explains. “Yotam loved CrossFit and played basketball,” says Iris. “CrossFit strengthened him.”
Despite his mental health issues and emotional difficulties, Yotam was a skilled drummer. He was scheduled to perform with his band on the night of Oct. 7 in Tel Aviv. Haim calls music “a frequency of love.” “Many musicians suffer from depression and use it for health and healing,” she says.
Iris acknowledges that the kidnapping of Yotam and his death changed her life.
Growing up in a secular home in Haifa, she never attended synagogue, didn’t fast on Yom Kippur, and was not Shabbat-observant.
“If you had asked me before Oct. 7 whether I was Jewish or Israeli, I would have told you unequivocally: Israeli. To me, ‘Jewish’ referred to religious people. Today, first and foremost, I am Jewish –and then, Israeli. This is a profound change that I have undergone.”
Change catalyst
Iris Haim is just one half of this story. For Rafi Shalev, an IDF reservist and company commander in the Givati Brigade, Friday, December 15, 2023, will remain forever ingrained in his memory. For him, the death of Yotam Haim was a catalyst for change.
“On that Friday morning,” he recalls, “I received a phone call from my battalion commander who informed me that there was a possibility that our brigade had mistakenly killed a hostage.
“My commander said, ‘Take the brigade rabbi with you, retrieve the body, and identify him.’”
Shalev and the rabbi drove in a military Hummer with a stretcher to the perimeter – it was not safe to take the jeep any further, and they were handed a body bag. When they opened it, they identified the remains as Yotam’s.
“That moment hit me very, very hard,” says Shalev. “I had evacuated bodies and dealt with casualties throughout the war, but I never expected something like this. To me, it felt like a tremendous failure. This was someone we should have brought home alive – not like this. The feeling was incredibly difficult.
“Together with the soldiers, we loaded the stretcher into the Hummer. We were extremely careful to treat the body with dignity. In the Hummer, there was a way to elevate the stretcher rather than place it on the floor, so I raised it and positioned him higher.”
Shalev and the brigade rabbi continued to Kibbutz Be’eri, where representatives of the Military Rabbinate were waiting to receive the body.
Four days later, Shalev was heading home from his base in Mitzpe Keramim, adjacent to Kochav Hashahar, overlooking the Jordan Valley. Along the way, he read a post that Iris had shared on Facebook, noting that the family was observing Yotam’s shiva at Moshav Shoeva in the Jerusalem Hills, near Shoresh. Shalev turned the car around and headed in that direction.
When Shalev arrived, the home was crowded with hundreds of people. Though he was told that no one could enter, he walked into the home and saw Iris – whom he had never met – along with others, looking at him in complete surprise.
“I introduced myself and said, ‘Hello. My name is Rafi. I came from the south. I was the one who evacuated your son’s body, and I want to tell you what happened.’”
Shalev told the story of what he had experienced. Iris began to cry and then played the recording that she had made in which she said that she was not angry with the soldiers who had shot her son and invited them to her home.
“You are the first soldier to come to us directly from the battlefield,” said Iris. “I want every soldier to hear this.”
Shalev says it is difficult to express the emotions he was feeling at that moment. “I left the house and immediately sent the recording to all of my commanders and soldiers. As it turned out, someone else in our unit also circulated it, and eventually the entire country heard it.”
When Rafi finally arrived home later that evening, he encountered a friend who told him he was in the final stages of approval as a kidney donor.
“I remember thinking to myself,” he says, “that there are no coincidences. This wasn’t random.”
Rafi, moved by his experiences handling Yotam’s remains and meeting Iris, decided he wanted to do something meaningful. He decided to donate a kidney. Rafi shared the news of his decision with Iris and wrote to her, “Thanks to Yotam, we are adding life.”
Two days later, he contacted Matnat Chaim, the Israeli organization that coordinates kidney donation, and underwent a battery of tests, which culminated in his donating a kidney in August 2024 to a young man named Nir Barzilai.
Iris accompanied Rafi and Nir throughout the process and presented Nir with a necklace that had the inscription “to believe, to see that there is good.”
“We’re partners in advancing the idea of adding life – adding goodness and adding light in the midst of darkness,” says Rafi. “It’s a message that transcends sectors and communities. Everyone wants it. Each person expresses it in their own way. I spend a great deal of time talking about it and trying, in my own way, to live it. The kidney donation is one part of that.”
Yotam lives on
Beit Yotam is in the midst of its fundraising campaign, and Iris says that Rafi’s central role in raising funds for the center stems from his understanding that Yotam’s death was not the end.
“A great deal of life will come forth from Yotam for the Jewish people,” she says.
“Beit Yotam will be for people who find it difficult to cope with the challenges of daily life – those facing personal struggles, depression, or mental illness, as Yotam did.
“Our philosophy follows Yotam’s example: never give up. People may fall, but they can always rise again. That’s the message we want to share – that we can choose hope, choose positive words, and look ahead, rather than destroy what we have or turn against one another.”
Haim says that Beit Yotam will also house a visitors’ center that will enable those who are unfamiliar with the struggles of those who are suffering from mental illness.
“The goal is to provide an immersive experience that allows visitors to see the world through the eyes of someone like Yotam. Much like programs that simulate life without sight to help people understand the experience of blindness, this center will help people better appreciate the realities and struggles faced by those dealing with mental health challenges.
“There is not enough awareness about who these people are. People think they are crazy or sick, but they are people just like you and me, who experience crises in life, and I believe they came to this world to make a change. We are all here to change something.”
Perhaps what best epitomizes Yotam’s mental health struggles and those of others is the semicolon symbol that Yotam had tattooed on his arm when he was 26.
Explains Iris, “The semicolon is an international symbol for coping with mental issues. It means that every person has a choice – they can choose to end their lives with a period and give up or choose a comma and continue.
“Yotam had to deal with these issues every day and every hour. He spoke about death and thought about harming himself. Life for him was a challenge, and it is so for many others like him.
“During our week of shiva, we adopted the symbol and said that we are also not ending things and stopping. People said to me, ‘You must continue to speak and deliver your messages, because they are life-changing. We used the semicolon in the campaign.
“Even when Yotam was in captivity, he encouraged people to continue, giving them his food. And even at the end, he chose to run away rather than hide, and he said to the army, ‘We are here.’ These are the choices that a person makes.”
Rafi suggests that people who have donated to the Beit Yotam campaign have made a conscious choice to be part of a force for good.
“During the fundraising campaign, I met many people, and what motivated them to reach into their pockets and donate was their connection to the message we are trying to promote – the belief that we must continue to do good. Iris embodies that message through her actions every day. People connect with that idea. They want to see more goodness in the world.
“Ultimately, that is our choice. As a society, we can focus on those who give, contribute, and make a positive impact, or we can be drawn to what is lacking, negative, and missing. We choose to focus on the good and to help it grow.”
Haim concludes that Israel is at a pivotal moment, with crucial decisions ahead about the country’s future.
“We have seen enough destruction caused by hatred among fellow Jews.
“Soon we will mark Tisha B’Av and read Eicha [Lamentations]. I say this almost like a rabbanit – even though I never imagined I would. The more I learn, the more I understand that this kind of division and hatred has existed throughout our history.
“But for those of us in this generation, Oct. 7 was a painful wake-up call. It struck us with tremendous force.
“I hear the same message from so many bereaved families: Why do we continue to hate one another? Why do division and hostility persist, even after everything we have been through? When more places like Beit Yotam are built, the better it will be for our country.”
As Iris Haim and others, including Rafi Shalev, carry forward the mission of doing good in Yotam Haim’s memory, she reflects on what Yotam would say if he could see how profoundly his life continues to touch people in Israel and beyond.
“He would say – he still does – ‘Keep going.’”