The Family Fund established by UJA in collaboration with the Hostage Forum addresses pressing needs that the Israeli government is unable to fulfill. To date, the Family Fund has distributed over $650,000 in financial assistance to more than 200 hostage family members (representing 100 families) who have put their lives on hold to fight day and night for the release of their loved ones. 

Cash grants pay for rent and groceries, alternative mental health treatments, even a car to get to and from a rally. As we are about to reach the end of the first year of the war, family members have been out of the workplace for months, and with many of their relatives still in Gaza, their needs are only growing. 

*This article was published before we learned the heartbreaking news of the six hostages murdered by Hamas.

Ziv Sela is a case manager at the Hostage Forum. At first, she was worried about taking on this role, but those fears were quickly dispelled.

“Contrary to my fears at the beginning about the atmosphere at the Hostage Forum, I discovered that there is so much hope in this place. The families walk around here with a conviction that they will see their loved ones entering the door,” Ziv says. “They only ask others who arrive to adhere to this path as well, that this is the only way they will return. To see shattered families with faith in their eyes is very powerful.”

On the other hand, there are also days when it feels like no one can breathe.

“When they announced they recovered the bodies of Yagev Buchstav, Nadav Popllewell, Haim Perry, Alex Danzig, Yoram Metzger, and Avraham Munder, there was a feeling of suffocation, and everything overflowed.”

The hostages remain on Ziv’s mind during the day at work and when she leaves at night. She says that sometimes she’ll catch a glimpse of a girl sitting in the café who looks like a hostage. And when she goes to sleep, the hostages are in her dreams as well.

Due to the circumstances, the case manager position requires focus and operational abilities, as well as extraordinary sensitivity. Ziv can’t help but get emotionally invested. 

But there is also living proof that things can turn around Two of the hostages who were rescued by the IDF — Almog Meir Jan and Louis Har — walk the halls of the forum, and Louis laughs loudly.

"Seeing them in the corridors, resurrected from the posters [of the hostages on the wall of the forum] we've become so used to — it's something that gives us all hope. 

“[The hostages are] not posters, they’re people who live among us and they need to return to us. And we, from our side, must do everything, day and night, to welcome them back with the warmest embrace.”