October 7: Belfast Jew tells of 'heartwarming and touching' support for community as remembrance events take place

​Michael Black, a 76-year-old member of the Belfast Jewish Community, was speaking after two events were held in the city to mark the Hamas-led bloodbath in 2023, when over 1,200 people in Israel were slaughtered.

The Belfast Jewish Community is the name of a group of orthodox Jews who worship at the synagogue in north Belfast.

It numbers around 54, and Mr Black says it is an ageing congregation (there are other, secular Jews in the city who are not part of the group).

Mr Black had been at a gathering in Queen’s University Belfast on Monday night to mark the October 7 anniversary, held in the Canada Room in the historic Lanyon Building.

He was there alongside other Jews, three chaplains (Presbyterian, Catholic, and Anglican), deputy first minister Emma Little-Pengelly, and former education minister Lord Weir.

And then this morning he was part of a contingent marking the beginning of the massacre by gathering at Belfast City Hall.

A group of around 20 people congregated for exactly 4.29am (the local equivalent of 6.29am, when the Hamas attack had begun in Israel).

"It's a moment to reflect, and to hope that we're seeing the beginning of the end of this catastrophe," Mr Black told the News Letter.

"I can't imagine what it's like for the immediate families and the hostages, over two years in captivity in awful conditions.

"But from the Jewish community's point of view it was very touching, heart-warming – the fact not just that the events had been held but also the emails and phone calls of support for the community."

He indicated that hopefully their children and grand-children won't have to witness anything like October 7, but added that some might say "the old expression 'never again'" is merely "wishful thinking".

"We can only hope," he said.

"We don't seem to learn."

On the day when the attacks happened, his clock-radio came on about 8am with the news.

He remembers waking his wife up.

"How can I forget? I just couldn't believe it. And it just got worse as more and more news came through."

He added: "This last couple of weeks has been very difficult for the community. There's what happened in Manchester, then this anniversary.

"Maybe this last few weeks has made people think a bit more about hatred and where society's going.

"Hopefully it'll turn a corner."

The event at 4.29am at City Hall had been organised by a group called March of Life.

It issued a statement to the News Letter, saying: “For many Jewish families, the images of that day brought back the worst traumas of persecution and the Shoah [the Holocaust].

"At the same time, a global wave of antisemitism and hatred of Israel swept through the streets and universities, which continues unabated to this day.

"In many countries, Jews are now wondering whether they can still live there...

"That is why we joined the worldwide silent vigils on October 7 at 6:29am, Israeli time.

"We share the grief of the Jewish people, stand alongside the Jewish state regardless of current politics, and raise our voices against antisemitism and hatred of Israel.”

Meanwhile, politicians spoke out in Stormont to mark the occasion today.

– POLITICIANS REFLECT –

UUP MLA Steve Aiken told the Assembly that there had been no justification for the massacre.

“Day in, day out, however, we still hear calls for support for the global intifada," he said.

"And how often do we see and hear on our streets ‘from the river to the sea’?

"Both mean death to all Jews everywhere.

"The fact that that barbarity can occur in the 21st century is not a surprise.

"Similar horrors, including actual genocides, are happening in Darfur, Myanmar, Sudan and Syria to the Yazidis and the Druze, as well as in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

"Equally appalling acts of humanity have occurred and are occurring there.

"There is, however, never a cheep or even a tweet from the anti-Israeli brigade at any cost to them.

"Remember that if it is not about Jews, it does not count.”

Meanwhile DUP MLA Paul Frew said he had visited the site of the Nova music festival, six months after Hamas members rampaged through it, killing and raping people.

"Hamas took not only their lives, but their dreams and hopes – and not only their dreams and hopes, but those of their families,” he said.

"Every day since then, there has been a missing person, an empty chair around a dining table and a member of the community lost who put in so much effort in their kibbutz.

"It was a surreal experience and one that will never leave me.

"I stand here today in solemn remembrance of all those who lost their lives in that atrocious terrorist attack and the war afterwards.”

– CORPSES RAPED AND CIVILIANS BEHEADED –

On June 10, 2024, a UN body called ‘The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel’ released a report into the atrocities of October 7.

It said that "at least 1,000 persons" carried out the raids into Israel from the Gaza Strip, with armed Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad members being aided by "unarmed civilians from Gaza," who helped to abduct people (with the youngest abductee being a nine-month-old baby).

It gives a breakdown of those killed, saying: "According to Israeli sources, more than 1,200 persons were killed directly by members of the various Palestinian armed groups and others and by rockets and mortars launched from the Gaza Strip.

"Of these, at least 809 were civilians, including at least 280 women, 68 were foreign nationals, and 314 were Israeli military personnel.

"Among those killed were 40 children (including at least 23 boys and 15 girls confirmed by the commission) and 25 persons aged 80 and over.

"In addition, 14,970 people were injured and transferred to hospitals for treatment.

"At least 252 people were abducted to Gaza as hostages, including 90 women, 36 children, older people and members of Israeli Security Forces."

The report also includes accounts of the killings and abductions, and has a section devoted to the impact on children.

"Twenty children lost both their parents on October 7, and 96 children lost one parent," it says.

"In some cases," it adds, "entire families, including children, were killed".

It quoted Israeli psychologist Dr Yuval Sa'ar-Himan as saying of the surviving children: "There is a horror here like no other... The children experienced their parents as unable to protect them. It's a unique trauma in its intensity."

Nonetheless, Hamas' propaganda operation portrayed the attackers as merciful.

In one case, an attacker was filmed holding the children of a young mother who Hamas had just murdered in the kibbutz of Holit, saying: “Look at the mercy in our hearts. Here are the children, we didn’t kill them.”

In another kibbutz called Nahal Oz, Hamas abducted a 17-year-old boy "to use him to lure more families out of their safe rooms", according to the UN report.

In video footage, the boy "is seen walking barefoot outside, surrounded by Hamas military-wing members, one of whom says to him, 'you are a child, not a baby'... [the boy] is then seen yelling in Hebrew outside other kibbutz homes, 'come out, come out' and 'come out, they won’t shoot you'".

The boy was later killed.

It also details many acts of butchery, including beheadings of women and, in one case, a 12-year-old girl.

In Nir Oz, at least one Thai worker "was subjected to an attempted decapitation as well as hacking upper body parts with a hoe while he was still alive".

In Be’eri, one 80-year-old man had his fingers severed by Hamas before being killed.

In another case, a man's body was found with a gun forced into his anus.

Another report, carried out by the UK's All-Party Parliamentary Group for UK-Israel, was published earlier this year, and looked in detail at the sexual violence carried out by Hamas.

It says gang rapes took place, as did "the rape of corpses of women".

Among the many pieces of testimony it cites is that of a woman called Sapir, who had been at the Nova music festival.

She hid alongside a man called Yura Karol after being shot in the back, and watched around 100 Hamas members congregate along a road.

The report says: "The men exchanged spare assault rifles, grenades, small missiles, and captured women.

"The first victim Sapir saw had copper-coloured hair and blood running down her back.

"An assailant pulled her by the hair, forced her to bend over and penetrated her.

"Every time she flinched, her assailant plunged a knife into her back.

"Sapir described another victim as 'shredded to pieces,' and was mutilated by an attacker who raped her and sliced off her breast with a box cutter: 'One continues to rape her, and the other throws her breast to someone else, and they play with it, throw it, and it falls on the road'".