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“At first I wasn’t allowed to make a sound, so I prayed silently in my heart, from the deepest place there is.”
By United with Israel Staff
A crowd gathered Friday morning at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv for a deeply moving ceremony as former hostage Bar Kuperstein put on tefillin alongside his father and Rabbi David Lau, former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel.
Kuperstein, who was abducted by Hamas terrorists on the morning of the October 7 massacre, called on the public to join him in prayer for the release of the remaining hostages.
“Dear people of Israel! For two years I was in captivity – two years during which I dreamed and prayed every day that I would be able to don tefillin. Tomorrow, Friday, at 10:00 a.m., I will don tefillin at a mass gathering dedicated to the release of all of our brothers, who are still there in captivity. Come with me, come fulfill my dream with me, come pray together with me. We will lay tefillin for the sake of the release of all of our hostages who are still there.”
At the ceremony, Kuperstein and his father, Tal, wrapped in prayer shawls, recited the blessing for tefillin together.
“At first I wasn’t allowed to make a sound, so I prayed silently in my heart, from the deepest place there is,” Kuperstein said. His words resonated with the crowd, highlighting the spiritual strength that sustained him during his captivity.
Men around them blew the shofar, sang, and danced, holding Tal Kuperstein’s hands as he sat in his wheelchair.
One of the men leading the prayers reflected on the terror of the October 7 attack. “When people sat in their sealed rooms and heard voices outside, how did they know who was speaking – if it was those attacking them or those saving them – but they heard the words ‘Shema Yisrael,’ the call of the Jewish people that is written into the scrolls placed in the tefillin, and they knew who was outside.”
Kuperstein then placed his hands over his eyes and led the crowd in reciting “Shema Yisrael,” a moment of shared faith and remembrance for the hostages still held in Gaza.
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