Friedrich Nietzsche reportedly said,” God is dead, and he is dead. However, in the putrid, pitch-dark tunnels beneath Gaza, where the prospect was almost absent and air was limited. Survival meant something more than physical strength for the dozens of Jewish victims who were killed in Hamas ‘ terrible October 7, 2023 harm. Within those subterranean cells, belief suddenly came back with unexpected force, sometimes in the form of spiritual passages from the Book of Psalms, occasionally using the liberal wisdom of Nietzsche’s philosophical despair. When everything else, including light, liberty, and identity, was lost, what brought them together was the same fundamental truth: the need for significance, for something to hang onto.
Nietzsche’s” Why” and Omer Shem Tov’s Psalm 20
Omer Shem Tov, 20, was a liberal Israeli at the time of his suicide, waiting tables, and making plans for a post-army visit to South America. He was immediately escorted into the Gaza pipe network while he was being seduced at the Nova music event along with friends and dropped into a plastic tub. Shem Tov began praying days into his prison without having access to watches or moonlight. His mother was reciting Psalm 20 while he was away in Herzliya, clinging to the verse, which the father had forgotten had adopted as his slogan. Faith came as a reaction to isolation, uncertainty, and fear for him, not as a rapid revelation. He began offering blessings on his meals, making pledges to God, and vowing to pray with tefillin if he ever went home. However, Nietzsche offered a purpose to accept if God had already given him tradition. The German scientist Viktor Frankl, a Holocaust survivor, popularized a saying that” He who has a why may keep with any how,” which is often said among victims. Before being executed by his prisoners, it was alleged that Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin had spoken about it. Like gospel, the phrase echoed through the cracks. It was after tattooed on one hostage’s arm.
Faith Rediscovered in Captivity
Shem Tov was not the only person to discover God in Gaza. Another hostages reportedly recited the Shema Yisrael meditation every day and attempted to read the kiddush over waters when wines wasn’t available, such as Eli Sharabi, who survived 491 days in prison only to discover his wife and two daughters had been killed. The word became opposition. Israeli observance wasn’t imposed on them by identity politics or physical pressure; it was a personal lifeline in the most oppressive circumstances imaginable. One prisoner described saving a jug of grape-flavored alcohol for the Sabbath worship. Instead of wearing cassocks, people placed their fingers on their faces. It may have appeared to the prisoners as theater. It had meaning for the victims.
Basement Nietzsche
And still, Nietzsche endured along with God. When they were free of all familiar, victims turned to a scientist who had buried God in The Gay Science and who had likewise taught years that suffering may be endured if one had a justification. They made a goal out of the presence of wish. They created ceremony in the absence of day. Yet Shem Tov’s prisoners unintentionally acted in a way that was unclear. The gunmen returned the reading materials they had recovered from an Israeli military system after it had advanced above the ground and had hidden codes. Spiritual poetry and a printed cards from Psalm 20 are among the scriptures. No names or titles. Only the sentence, please. It resembled the card that a prisoner assistance group had given his mother months before.
The Perseverance of Faith, the Fragility of Living
Shem Tov once spent 50 times in a stifling hole cell in the dark. He had asthma attacks that went almost neglected after receiving a biscuit a day and a few drops of saline waters. He begged God to walk him anywhere else in anguish. His prisoners moved him to a better room within a few minutes. He saw it as holy action, whether by accident or by magic. He then managed to survive thanks to his silent cooperation, which included helping to clear particles after tunnel collapses. He kept the Sabbath going. He saved a bottle of wine for a time of grace. He maintained faith in a setting where it was meant to love it. He is now at home and practices regular tefillin prayer, as he had promised. He has visited Jewish communities in the US and spoke of endurance as well as struggling. His family also observes the Sabbath right now. Theirs is not a story of spiritual transformation, but rather one of rediscovery of how culturally disconnected old habits and modern philosophy have evolved into tools of survival.
