Communities in Israel’s south balance regeneration and preservation a year after Oct. 7

Fourteen months after October 7, Israel's southern communities struggle to balance rebuilding with preserving memories as tourists visit attack sites while residents return home.

By NICHOLAS POTTER DECEMBER 20, 2024 03:10 Updated: DECEMBER 20, 2024 03:13

Protesters in Sderot gather for the 'Gaza March,' May 14, 2024 (photo credit: Via Maariv)

Travel buses with scores of domestic tourists line the sidewalks next to the square where the police station of Sderot once stood. A memorial comprised of towering white stone columns inscribed with quotes now marks the site that saw heavy fighting on October 7, 2023, between some 60 Palestinian terrorists and Israeli police units supported by locals.

On the evening of the Hamas-led attack, the Southern District Command made the decision to flatten the besieged police station – with aerial bombings, tank shelling, and machinery – in order to neutralize the remaining militants who had barricaded themselves inside. Now, the site of the carnage has become a memorial – and a tourist attraction, at least for dozens of Israelis on Tuesday, as international visitor numbers [to the area] remain just a fraction of what they were before the attack.

The police station in Sderot is emblematic of the development of Israel’s South, 14 months on from the October 7 attack, a region trying to balance regeneration and preservation as it decides how to move on from the deadliest day for civilians in Israeli history – a day that shattered local communities.

Around 1,200 people were murdered during the attack when thousands of terrorists broke through the border between Gaza and Israel and rampaged through neighboring communities. Two hundred and eighty-eight local children are now orphans as a result. Of the 100 hostages still in captivity, 42 come from Sderot and the surrounding municipalities, moshavim, and kibbutzim. Five hundred and twenty-five buildings were destroyed.

In the aftermath of the attack, almost all civilians were evacuated from the region. But since then, 53,000 out of the 64,000 residents have returned home, Deganit Sanker-Lange from the Tkuma Directorate said at a press conference for international media on Tuesday in Sderot. The Directorate, a government agency overseen by the Prime Minister’s Office, was formed in the wake of October 7 to help rebuild the area.

Damage to a house in the Israeli city of Sderot which was hit by rockets fired by Hamas militants in Gaza, into Israel. May 15, 2021. (credit: AVI ROCCAH/FLASH90)

“Tkuma means ‘rebirth’ in Hebrew,” Sanker-Lange, herself from Sderot, explained: “But we want this region to be even better than it was before October 7.” The Directorate has budgeted NIS 7 billion for this year, according to Sanker-Lange. Many kibbutzniks have been rehoused in new neighborhoods in nearby kibbutzim that were spared or defended on October 7, or in cities such as Tel Aviv or Be’er Sheva. All schools and kindergartens in the region are fully functioning again – and some 1,000 new residents have even since moved to Sderot, she added.

“We also want to bring prosperity to these communities,” Sanker-Lange said. “And we want it to flourish and become an attractive area.” In a region strongly reliant on a decimated agriculture industry since October 7, this remains an ambitious plan.

A possible solution

ONE SOLUTION is investing in higher education, said Amit Kochavi, a local tech entrepreneur and advisor to the mayor of Sderot.

“Because we want to bring tech companies here,” he said, “and that will create economic growth.”

At the nearby Sapir College, new faculties are set to open in the fields of engineering and computer science, he said. Kochavi also plans to boost English learning among children and teenagers in order to attract international entrepreneurs in the future.

---

---

Another solution is tourism, Sanker-Lange said, mentioning the police station turned memorial in Sderot. “We call it ‘dark tourism,’” she said. “But we want to build a beautiful tourism [industry] because we have so many things here in the Tkuma region.”

Be’eri, a kibbutz just 17 km. south of Sderot, heavily attacked on October 7, has been showing groups of visitors the destruction wrought by Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups – a form of “dark tourism.” Some 130 residents were murdered on that day after hundreds of heavily armed militants stormed the kibbutz in the early hours of the morning – over 10% of the community.

Fourteen months later, entire streets in Be’eri still look like fresh crime scenes. Family homes have been reduced to burnt-out shells, dreams to rubble. Living rooms have been sprayed with bullets. Banners hang over the houses of those murdered or taken hostage, bearing their names and photos as tributes, turning the once sleepy community into a cemetery.

Just 180 of Be’eri’s 1,000 residents have since returned, with many of the rest now housed in another kibbutz nearby, after spending a year in hotels at the Dead Sea. They plan to build a new pedestrian spine and educational center, in addition to rebuilding the lost homes. But while government funds cover some basic construction, many other costs are not covered, residents say.

One of the returnees is Natasha Cohen, 53, who grew up in South Africa and moved to Be’eri in the 1990s as a volunteer, before falling in love – to both her later husband and the community. When Cohen returned to the kibbutz two months after October 7, the stench of corpses still wafted through it, she said.

Upon their return, Cohen and other kibbutz members had to first clear the war-torn streets of their small community and pack up the belongings of those murdered. “We put a lot of work in here,” she explained while walking down a path connecting many of the destroyed homes in the neighborhood Ha’kerem, followed by her German shepherd, who ran in and out of the abandoned houses. But in the case of some of the 18 hostages taken from Be’eri to Gaza, it is not clear if they are alive or dead. And so their belongings remain, waiting for them to come home.

Cohen is critical of indefinitely memorializing Be’eri. “People don’t want to live in Auschwitz,” she said. “Imagine the worst thing that could possibly happen in your life – the burnt-out houses are a constant reminder of that for us.”

By the end of the year, Be’eri – left-leaning and democratically organized until this day – plans to hold a vote on what to do with the destruction left after the attack. “Some want to leave this whole neighborhood as a form of remembrance,” Cohen said. “But others want to bulldoze everything.”

Cohen thinks that the community will vote in favor of demolishing the ravaged neighborhoods. In Kfar Aza and Nir Oz – two nearby kibbutzim also attacked on October 7 – the demolition of some partially destroyed homes has already begun.

In some parts of Be’eri, work has also already commenced on tearing down the ruins of apartments. But reconstruction is slow, as Be’eri relied on Palestinian laborers from Gaza before October 7, regarding them as neighbors they could work with.

“We believed in peace,” Cohen said. “We believed that there could be a future.”

However, it is unlikely that the 120 homes that need to be rebuilt in Be’eri will be on the land of the largely destroyed neighborhood of Hakerem.

“The ground is stained with blood,” Cohen said.

There will be at least some form of memorial in the kibbutz, she explained – a tribute to the victims of October 7. “The Jewish nation is very good at keeping memorials and memorial days,” Cohen explained. “But we don’t have to constantly see the destruction.”