Idan Amedi onstage for 1st major show since being wounded in Gaza
‘Fauda’ star tells sold-out Jerusalem audience about his gratitude, grief and pain since recovering from the explosion that seriously injured him and killed six of his friends
Singer and actor Idan Amedi returned to the stage Wednesday night for his first major concert since being seriously wounded during his reserve duty in Gaza last year.
In front of a 8,000-strong crowd in Jerusalem, Amedi preformed his new single “Superman,” dedicated to the memories of Alexei, Akiva, Gavriel and Eliran, his friends who were killed in Gaza.
Perhaps best known for his role on the hit TV show “Fauda,” Amedi was seriously injured by an explosion on January 8, 2024, as he served in the Combat Engineering Corps reserves in Gaza. Six soldiers were killed and several others, including Amedi, were injured in the incident, which was apparently accidentally caused by troops.
At the Jerusalem concert, Amedi spoke in depth about his experience, detailing his first moments in the hospital, his complicated emotions, and his recovery.
“On January 8th [2024], I arrived at Sheba Hospital, burned and sooty, sedated and intubated,” Amedi told the audience, according to the Kan broadcaster. “The name ‘Anonymous, 22 years old’ was written on my arm tag,” said the 37-year-old performer.
He told the crowd that he felt like he had lived “a whole life in one year.”
עידן עמדי בהופעה ראשונה לאחר הפציעה בעזה והתהליך השיקום הארוך pic.twitter.com/d0SfObNty0
— ישראל היום (@IsraelHayomHeb) February 19, 2025
“You ask what you go through in a year like that? You die and then suddenly you are given life again,” Amedi said.
He said that in the hospital, he “thanked God that the shrapnel missed the spinal cord by two millimeters,” but that moments later he was fighting with God “for taking my friends to him.”
“Then you try to get up from the grief and pain, surgeries, treatments, doctors, one press conference and ‘poof’ you’re at home in your room, starting to heal the fractures,” he added.
“Slowly, the songs began to come to me,” Amedi told the crowd. “About the child I was and about the man I sometimes became against my will.”
“I write about a people and a country, and my heart aches with longing. These are songs of loss, songs of hope,” he said.
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned this year, it’s that you need to sanctify the moment, the now,” he said. “Everything else doesn’t exist, everything else is air. So thank God that I’m here – and that you’re here with me. So sing, cry, move, dance. As if there’s no more ‘the next moment.’ As if it’s just you and me.”
While Wednesday’s show marked his first full concert since being wounded, Amedi’s first live performance was a surprise show in late December for hundreds of bereaved kids at a Hanukkah winter camp in southern Israel.
According to Kan, Amedi has sold over 60,000 tickets for his nine-show tour around the country, including upcoming shows in Tel Aviv.
The star actor and singer recently announced that he would not return for season 5 of the hit Netflix show “Fauda,” citing his ongoing recovery.
