Former Hostage Rom Braslavski: “I Choose to Rise Again and Again”

Former hostage Rom Braslavski has opened up about his struggle to rebuild his life after captivity, describing both the trauma he continues to carry and the faith that helps him choose, each day, to move forward.

“This captivity was a curse, and also Hashem’s blessing to me. Many people ask me how I survived it. The truth is, I myself have no answer,” Braslavski said in a video posted to his Instagram account.

“I don’t know how I survived. Logically, by all reason, I should be dead,” he continued.

For Braslavski, the fact that he survived and returned home is nothing short of a miracle. But he also sees his survival as carrying a responsibility.

“The very fact that I was released gives me an obligation to speak for those people who did not return to us, those who were murdered on October 7, or during captivity, or the soldiers who fought and risked their lives.”

“Will I Return to Life, or Remain Captive in Gaza?”

Braslavski said his experience in captivity profoundly shaped the person he is today.

“It shaped my character. Today, now that I am free, I am dealing with very severe post-trauma. It is very difficult to return to life after such a massive upheaval.”

But he said he now faces a choice about how he will live with everything he endured.

“My question is this: Will I return to life, or will I remain captive in Gaza? Will I get up and strengthen myself again and again, and not let them win? Will I stay in my room and not let the sun come in?”

His answer is unequivocal.

“If I do that, then they won, not me, if I fall into depression and sadness. That is not something I am willing to do.”

Instead, Braslavski says he makes a conscious decision each morning to get up and allow light back into his life.

“Every day, I make this choice again: to open the blinds and get up early, to let the sun into my life, to let it light up my dark face. Dark inside, lit outside.”

“The Light From Outside Slowly Seeps Into the Soul”

For Braslavski, that light is more than a metaphor.

“The light from outside slowly seeps into the soul. The post-trauma, the bodies I saw, the blood I saw, all the people who died, whom I carry on my shoulders, all my friends who were murdered, this is reason enough not to get up,” he said.

Yet despite everything he carries, Braslavski says he continues to make the same choice again and again: to rise.

“Again and again, I choose to rise from the blow I was dealt, to thank Hashem: ‘I give thanks before You, living and enduring King, for restoring my soul within me; great is Your faithfulness.’”

He concluded by expressing gratitude to Hashem for his survival and freedom.

“Hashem showed me compassion by saving me from this house of slavery.”