Sagui Dekel-Chen sings song of hope to remaining hostages
Accompanied by band named for slain friend, freed captive, who says he’s ‘just a dad who sings,’ recounts how music helped him survive: ‘Wipe off your tears and sing with me’
Urging remaining captives to “wipe off your tears and sing with me,” released hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen performed the song “Keren Shemesh” (Ray of Sunshine) on Friday with musicians from a project named for his friend Tamar Kedem Siman Tov, who was murdered in the Hamas onslaught of October 7, 2023.
“Don’t go, ray of sunshine, our day isn’t over yet,” he sang, covering a 2022 hit by Benaia Berabi. “Smile, it suits you — it makes my day.”
“My sun was taken from me for 498 days, but I decided not to give in [and] spoke to the sun every day,” Dekel-Chan said in the video, published just 13 days after he returned to Israel as part of the ceasefire and hostage deal with Hamas. “I ask everyone who hears me — don’t lose hope. Trust me, it runs deep.”
In the video, Dekel-Chen could be seen bouncing his baby daughter on his knee as his wife Avital, or Mili, danced with their two other daughters.
Their youngest daughter was born two months after the abduction of her father, a dual Israel-American citizen. He met her only after his release.
“I’m not a singer, just a dad who sings,” he said.
(Click here for a version with English subtitles)
Dekel-Chen said that in captivity, he used to “get up in the morning, go to the corner of the room, play love songs in my head — quiet, favorite songs — and even add some moves.”
“I created songs for myself that only two weeks ago I was able to write on paper and sing out loud,” he said.
Dekel-Chen said “Keren Shemesh” was one of his daughters’ favorite songs. “They would sing it in the car [and] in the living room on Fridays,” he said. “And now after so many Fridays of loneliness, I’m singing it here with them.”
“For me, Mili has been a ray of sunshine for almost 21 years,” said Dekel-Chen, 36, who met his future wife in middle school. “Since then, my daughters have joined and made the sun even bigger.”
“Don’t go, ray of sunshine,” said Dekel-Chen, quoting the upbeat, soft-rock tune. “I’ll do everything so you’d stay. I’ve done everything so you’d stay. I felt every day how I love you more and more and more.”
“Thanks to Mili, friends and the entire nation of Israel, I’m here today,” he said. “To my friends who don’t see sunlight there in captivity, be strong — your soul needs a strong body, your body needs a strong soul.”
Dekel-Chen was accompanied by musicians from the Tamari Project, founded by his brother Itai in memory of Kedem Siman Tov, an activist from Kibbutz Nir Oz who was murdered along with her husband and three young children.
Sagui Dekel-Chen and Kedem Siman Tov founded the southern Bikurm youth commune for music excellence in 2014. Iair Horn, who returned from Gaza along with Dekel-Chen, had served as the commune’s cook.
Horn, his brother Eitan and Dekel-Chen were among the many kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz on October 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza. Eitan Horn remains in captivity.
Dekel-Chen was shot in the shoulder during the Hamas onslaught, and endured torture in captivity that left scars on his body. He was completely cut off from the outside world while in Gaza, and unsure whether his family had survived the onslaught. Upon his return, he said: “I’m great, I’m great, I have a new daughter.”
Kibbutz Nir Oz was virtually destroyed in the onslaught, with roughly a quarter of its 400-odd members abducted or murdered. The community has since relocated to a designated neighborhood in Kiryat Gat.
In a recent conversation with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — who has not been to Nir Oz since the massacre there — Dekel-Chen offered to take the premier on an apolitical tour of the ravaged community.
Terror groups in the Gaza Strip are holding 59 hostages, including 58 abducted in the Hamas onslaught, at least 35 of whom have been confirmed dead by the IDF.
