I had just landed back in Israel from a business trip to Copenhagen. For a few days, I’d been away from the heaviness that hovers over this country, breathing in a different rhythm, almost forgetting the constant ache of our current reality.

It was dark at 4:00 am when my taxi from the airport wound its way up the steep road to my village. The driver slowed at the crest of the hill. “Isn’t this where the hostage’s family lives?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered quietly. “Guy Gilboa-Dalal.”

An hour later, I slipped into bed, comforted by the knowledge that my sons were fast asleep at their father’s house just a few minutes away. Safe. Alive. We were the lucky ones.

Just a few floors down lives the Gilboa-Dalal family, whose world has been turned upside down. Their daughter, Gaya, grew up alongside my oldest son. She would come over often, sometimes with friends, sometimes with a fresh batch of........

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