Holocaust survivor describes kidnapping of her grandson Omer by Hamas terrorists as 'my real Holocaust'

Tzili Wenkert, an 83-year-old Israeli woman who survived the Holocaust as a child, described the Oct. 7, 2023, kidnapping of her grandson, Omer Wenkert, by Hamas terrorists as “my real Holocaust.”

“I may be a Holocaust survivor,” she told Ynet News, “but my real Holocaust was when they kidnapped Omer.”

Omer, who was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists from the Nova Music Festival on Kibbutz Re’im, spent 17 months in captivity in Gaza before being released in late February.

Tzili was just six weeks old when her family was deported by the Nazis to a ghetto. In stark contrast, her grandson was 22 years old when he was kidnapped by Hamas operatives.

Wenkert was born in 1941 in the city of Chernivtsi, now in Ukraine, near the Romanian border.

“We traveled part of the way by train and walked the rest,” she said. “Six of us lived in a tiny room for three and a half years. My parents sold everything – clothes, dishes, jewelry – just to survive,” she added.

She recalled the suffering during the Holocaust.

“People died from hunger, disease, cold, shelling. They were sent to forced labor,” Wenkert recalled. “My mother made me clothes from her own, even shoes from my grandfather’s hat.”

She described some of the vivid memories she has, despite being a toddler at the time.

“I still see myself standing in the doorway, looking at the three straw mattresses. That image comes back to me all the time,” Wenkert said.

After the war, she and her family relocated to Romania. In 1965, they emigrated to Israel. She explained that her family chose to settle in the Jewish state two years before the outbreak of the Six-Day War in 1967.

“I didn’t want my children growing up as immigrants. This is our country,” Wenkert said.

Many years later, she became attached to her oldest grandson, Omer, whom she described as “a gift from the heavens.”

She recalled the moment she reunited with him after his long period of captivity in Gaza.

“When he came back, you couldn’t recognize him. He was so thin.” She was nevertheless grateful that he returned home to Israel alive.

“When I hugged him in the hospital, it felt like I had a new grandson. It was like hugging him as a newborn. You could see his bones through his shirt. I told myself, ‘Where there are bones, there will be flesh.’ And now, he’s already doing better. He knows how to smile, how to laugh. He’s not withdrawn – he’s meeting people and friends again,” the proud grandmother said.

She is impressed with the strength that Omer displayed during the time he was held hostage.

“When I got to the hospital, a doctor asked if I was a Holocaust survivor. I said yes. He told me, ‘Omer’s like you – he’s strong,’” Wenkert recalled.

“Maybe it runs in the family,” she continued. However, she believes that Omer’s experience in Gaza was worse than her Holocaust trauma.

“But I was a baby – everyone protected me. He went through something far worse. He’s fully aware. They beat him, isolated him, starved him. But he didn’t break. He doesn’t complain. For him, it was like a test of strength,” she said.

Wenkert also voiced concern over the global rise in antisemitism following the Oct. 7 Hamas-led massacre, which resulted in the brutal deaths of 1,200 Israelis and the abduction of 251 people from southern Israel, sparking the ongoing war.

“I see how much antisemitism has grown in the world. I’m very worried. I don’t want my grandchildren going through anything like this. Yes, we have a country now – but I don’t see it doing very much,” she warned.

During an interview with Israeli media in March, Omer recalled the systematic humiliation and beatings that Hamas terrorists inflicted upon him and other hostages.

“Suddenly, two people come through the tunnel and simply beat you with everything they have… You lose consciousness from a punch and then another one wakes you up,” he said.