Israeli survivor haunted by Oct. 7

Tells harrowing story on U.S. speaking tour

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Ilya Tarshansky readily admits he’s not a great public speaker.

So, he sat Thursday evening in front of an audience of about 100 people at the Folsom Community Center and answered their questions as best as he could.

He’s a survivor of the Oct. 7 surprise Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel. Tarshansky, his 15-yearold son, Lior, and his 13-year-old daughter, Gali, hid in a safe room of their home in Kibbutz Be’eri. They desperately held the safe room door closed as invaders tried to knock the door open, before their home was set on fire.

Disoriented by the intense black smoke, Tarshansky and his daughter escaped the burning home. He was rescued hours later but his daughter was taken by Hamas terrorists and held hostage for 54 days. His son never made it out — they found his body in the safe room.

Tarshansky was asked how he copes with the memories of what happened to him and his children that day.

“When I’m busy with something, I don’t think about it. When I’m in solitude at home? Yeah, of course,” Tarshansky said at Thursday’s event in Folsom. “To me, I’m still on the 7th of October. I don’t believe seven months has passed.”

The Jewish Community Center of Folsom and El Dorado Hills invited Tarshansky to provide a firsthand account of what he and his children went through, along with the devastation of his community of Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel a few miles from the border with Gaza.

He has been on a speaking tour in the United States talking to groups about what he went through and seeking donations to help survivors of the Hamas terrorist attacks.

Rabbi Yossi Grossbaum of Chabad Jewish Community Center, who introduced Tarshansky, said the discussion was not a pleasant topic but extremely important in the context of the circumstances. He reminded the audience that more than 100 hostages taken from Israel remain in captivity.

The Folsom event was held amid numerous pro-palestinian protests at college campuses throughout the United States, including Sacramento State and UC Davis, seeking an end to the ongoing war in Gaza.

Before Tarshansky sat down for the Q&A session, he showed the audience a 25-minute video that included text messages of panic from his daughter to her mother as Hamas terrorists were trying to break into the safe room.

Tarshansky said his daughter was held in a few different places throughout her captivity, spending most of it with other hostages in the home of a Muslim family who had no connection with the Hamas attacks. The home had no running water, and they had little food.

Even after the parents were informed Gali would be released, Tarshansky said they were unable to feel a sense of relief until she ran to them and hugged them. They now live in Tel Aviv.

“We worried about her condition. Luckily, she wasn’t abused,” Tarshansky said.

Jose Luis Villegas The Sacramento Bee Ilya Tarshansky reflects for a moment during his presentation on Thursday at the Folsom Community Center when asked a question about his 15-year-old son Lior, who was killed during the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack in Israel.