Three years after October 7, we know more about what happened and hear ever more explanations of why it happened. The attack is placed within the history of the conflict, political arguments and discussions of causes and consequences.
Historical context matters. As a historian, I know the danger of ignoring complexity. That is precisely why accuracy matters too. Hamas’s assault on October 7 was a terrorist attack. It was the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. The murder of civilians and the taking of hostages remain crimes, whatever the political convictions of those judging them.
For someone far from Israel, this may seem another episode in someone else’s conflict. During a discussion in London, a man described the violence to me as a struggle between “stiff-necked tribes of the East.” Such language makes other people’s lives seem distant and abstract.
Yet October 7 raises a question relevant to every society: how reliable are promises of safety, and what happens when institutions entrusted with protecting people fail?
My son Yuval was killed on October 7, 2023. He was 21. He served in the 77th Battalion of the Seventh Armored Brigade and had only days left before completing his compulsory military service.
Three years later, I still struggle to speak about him in the past tense. Grammar demands something a father cannot accept. Yuval had plans. A life in all its possibilities lay ahead of him. That future will never happen.
Anniversaries invite us to take stock. For a family that has lost a child, the expression is frightening. Loss does not become a completed story from which we draw a lesson and move to the next chapter. It enters family conversations, celebrations, plans and decisions, while life continues.
Even laughter or absorption in a task can bring guilt, as though these moments carry us away from the person we lost.
As October 7 recedes in time, it becomes a historical event and a subject of political debate. For us, it also remains a name. Other families have their own names, voices and conversations that will never take place. Remembrance must preserve individual lives behind the numbers.
Israel still faces real threats. Every circumstance surrounding October 7 therefore requires a serious, objective, comprehensive investigation, independent of those whose decisions it must examine. Those conducting it need access to the relevant records and the authority to establish individual responsibility.
The public must know which warnings were received, how threats were assessed, why defenses failed and how decisions were made during the attack’s first hours. Earlier political, military and intelligence decisions must also be examined. The findings must lead to changes capable of preventing another catastrophe.
The courage of soldiers and civilians who resisted the terrorists makes this obligation more urgent. Those who saved others when the state was unprepared, and the families of those killed, have a right to the truth.
Responsibility also extends beyond Israel’s borders. The international community must help resolve the conflict while examining how its own members and institutions contributed to its deterioration.
Iran, a member of the United Nations, supported Hamas for years with money, weapons and training. Calls for peace must be accompanied by action against the networks that enable terrorist organizations to prepare their next attack.
International institutions require scrutiny too. In August 2024, the UN reported that evidence from its internal investigation indicated that UNRWA employees may have participated in the October 7 attacks. That demands rigorous examination of recruitment, supervision and spending. International status carries an obligation of accountability.
The longstanding approach to Palestinian refugees also deserves examination. UNRWA registers descendants of refugees, so its registered population includes successive generations. The international community should ask how far this system has helped people build sustainable futures, and how far it has preserved dependence on an unresolved conflict. It should examine how refugee suffering has been used for political pressure and how integration has been obstructed. Assistance should create prospects for ordinary life.
International engagement must include ending support for terrorism, overseeing civilian assistance and encouraging responsible Palestinian governance. Negotiations have produced agreements and missed opportunities, but no final settlement. After October 7, security must be a verifiable condition of any peace proposal.
Israel’s small size and limited strategic depth make territorial decisions inseparable from civilian safety. It cannot accept concessions that create additional threats to its existence. Its citizens would bear the consequences in their lives, while international mediators might bear only the disappointment of another failed plan.
Israel must remain the world’s only nation-state of the Jewish people. That is especially important as Jewish communities abroad face a sharp rise in antisemitic hatred, threats and violence. I believe this right is compatible with equal citizenship for all Israelis and with Palestinians’ right to dignified, secure lives.
For a fallen soldier’s father, these questions are concrete. I know Yuval defended his country heroically. I also want to know whether everything necessary was done to protect him. Love for my country obliges me to ask difficult questions.
Losing a child does not make a parent infallible. My loss does not make every political judgment correct or release me from checking facts and hearing objections. But I am entitled to demand that the human cost of decisions be taken seriously.
I demand security for Israel, my children and my fellow citizens. I cannot be indifferent to Palestinian families who have lost children. Compassion requires distinguishing terrorists responsible for their crimes from civilians caught in the conflict. It is compatible with the state’s duty to protect its citizens.
I often reflect on Viktor Frankl’s experience and on living after profound loss. I seek no meaning that could justify Yuval’s death. Nothing can provide an equivalent answer to losing my son.
But a question remains: what is required of me now? I have a family, children, colleagues and responsibilities. I can care for them while the pain remains.
Society should remember that bereaved people sometimes have strength only for the essentials. Choosing one’s response does not mean controlling one’s pain. Sometimes the available choice is small: accepting help, speaking to someone close, doing one necessary thing.
Public remembrance also acquires meaning through our treatment of the living: how honestly we examine failures, how seriously we address threats and how carefully we protect those who will live with our decisions.
Yuval will always be 21. We continue to live and make choices. I would hope that remembering the victims of October 7 helps all of us carry greater responsibility for the future.
Dr. Haim Ben Yakov is Director General of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress and Executive Vice President of the Institute for Euro-Asian Jewish Studies. He previously headed the Jewish Agency’s representation in Moscow and the Baltic States.