The Promised Podcast – "Ran's Sheloshim" Edition

Date: February 26, 2026
Host: TLV1 Studios
Main Theme:
Marking the “shloshim” (30-day mark of mourning) for Ron Gvili—the last returned hostage from October 7, 2023—the episode explores the personal and national stories interwoven with his life and death. Through Ron’s narrative, the host reflects on how Israeli wars end—or never truly end—both in historical memory and in everyday Israeli life. The podcast juxtaposes personal grief with the collective process of coming to terms, healing, and moving forward, drawing parallels with previous Israeli wars and their societal aftermath.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Story of Ron Gvili

• Background:
  • Ron Gvili (24) was a police motorcycle cop, previously a Golani infantryman who fought physical adversity to serve.
  • On October 7, 2023, while on sick leave and still injured, Ron felt compelled to join his friends in the defense effort during the Hamas attack.
  • He was killed in battle near Kibbutz Alumim, taken hostage into Gaza, and was either dead or mortally wounded when captured.
  • His return: After two years, and a complex search-and-identification effort, his body was returned—the last among hostages (01:00–08:00).
• Host’s Personal Account:
  • The host recounts receiving the news of Ron’s homecoming in a hushed, emotional moment.
  • Description of the mass mobilization: 700 soldiers, forensic experts, and volunteers meticulously searching a vast, chaotic burial ground in Gaza for Ron.
  • Moving details from Lt. Col. Eliashav Varman and Dr. Esti Sharon about finding and identifying Ron, highlighting the emotional toll and deep commitment (08:00–15:30).
    • Quote, Lt. Col. Varman:

      "We exhumed more than 700 slain people… Six dentists around him from every direction. Everyone starts to pray… I see her eyes getting red. Suddenly a tear… I see a smile." (13:30)

    • Quote, Dr. Sharon:

      “My hands were shaking, a feeling of crazy emotion, my heart beating 200 beats a minute. And still I know I have to be super focused because there are no mistakes with things like this.” (14:50)

2. Ron’s Funeral and Community Response

• Hundreds, including dignitaries (President, PM), attended Ron’s funeral in Maitar.
• His mother, Tali Gvili, gave a deeply personal eulogy, speaking directly to Ron with a mix of pain and pride:
  • Memorable Moment:

    "You went out to defend everyone, and they all deserve your sacrifice. 700 soldiers searched for you. 700 soldiers found you. 700 soldiers brought you home. There is nothing like this people anywhere in the world. The eye cries bitterly, yet the heart is happy." (17:30)

• The collective mourning, gifts, and support from across Israeli society marked Ron as “the child of everyone.” (16:30–20:00)

3. The Jewish Ritual of Shloshim and Its Meaning

• Host explains the laws of shloshim (thirty days of mourning), referencing Maimonides, the Rambam, and how for 873 days (since October 7), the entire country has been in an extended state of mourning (“some shloshim or another for someone killed in this war”).
• The closure of Ron's shloshim is posited as the closest symbolic end to the war that began on October 7. (20:00–23:00)
  • Quote:

    “…for 873 days, we have never not been in a shloshim from this war until today, when Ron Veli's shloshim comes to a close. Now, for the first time… we can wash our clothes, trim our hair, declare our love, meet friends for drinks … as close to an end of this war … as we are going to have.” (22:30)

4. How Israeli Wars End: Historical Parallels and Contrasts

• War of Independence (1948–49):
  • Focus was on pragmatic rebuilding and manic activity, setting aside collective grief.
  • Ben Gurion’s Diary:
    • Excerpt listing tasks for postwar rebuilding, ignoring mourning as a national necessity. (24:00–28:00)
• Six-Day War (1967):
  • Initial period marked by euphoria, national pride, and triumphalism (parades, commemorative records, and poetry).
  • Contrasted by the book The Seventh Day, revealing soldiers’ distress, moral discomfort, and national ambivalence:
    • Amos Oz on The Seventh Day:

      "We did not want people to say what they did in the war, but rather what they experienced ... it is a small service to the truth." (31:30)

• Yom Kippur War (1973):
  • Led to an “epistemological crisis”—public loss of faith in government, military competence, and the value of life by leaders.
  • Popular protest and the Agranat Commission: exposes leadership failures, leading (eventually) to Golda Meir’s resignation. (37:00–45:00)
• First Lebanon War (1982–2000):
  • Protracted, aimless conflict; deaths felt pointless (“Gibor Gadol” protest song: “They shoot and they cry.”).
  • Rise of “Four Mothers” protest movement, ultimately forcing IDF withdrawal: the power of grassroots activism in ending wars.
  • Quote, Rachel Ben Dor (Four Mothers):

    "My son is going back to Lebanon tomorrow morning. I will be protesting on the streets tonight to save his life." (50:30)

5. The End of the Gaza War: Contradictory Emotions and Social Renewal

• Host frames Ron’s shloshim as demarcating the end of the Gaza War, with layered parallels to previous wars:

  • Israeli society is simultaneously rebuilding, mourning, critiquing leadership, and forming new hope—mirroring past postwar periods.
  • Surge of activity: new projects, university programs, political organizing, and vibrant grassroots initiatives signal a desire to work toward a different future. (58:00–01:03:00)

• Quote from a wedding eulogy shortly after October 7:

  "I learned that you have to live with feelings and sentiments and emotions that entirely contradict one another … Each of those things its place and somehow to connect to what you need to connect to. And after that, put it aside. Maybe … there is a time. A time to be born, a time to die, a time to cry, a time to laugh, a time to mourn, a time to dance. Maybe these are not all different times. Maybe it all happens together." (01:04:30)

• The host notes the growing sense of hope amidst sorrow, seen in new cultural initiatives, inter-community (Jewish/Palestinian) meetings, and music projects—the persistence of life and optimism.

6. Debates Over Protest and Change

• Reference to controversy after Brig. Gen. Gal Hirsch claimed “Bring Them Home Now” protests adversely affected the war effort, but the host credits such movements with pressuring leaders to end the war and prioritize hostages, asserting Israeli democracy’s activist DNA. (01:10:00–01:13:00)
  • Quote:

    "But in truth, Gal Hirsch was right. We did put the government back on its heels… but for the protests, the war probably would still be going and some of the hostages would probably still be in Gaza." (01:12:20)

7. The Return of Hope

• New projects, creative and communal initiatives, and renewed social bonds suggest the process of collective healing has begun—not by forgetting trauma, but by persisting through it.

• The host receives from philosopher Avi Sagi two new books on hope, quoting Sagi’s conclusion:

  • Quote, Avi Sagi:

    "Hope is an outcome of life. When we decide to get up in the morning and go back to our day to day lives … we express our belief in the world and also in ourselves. … Healing. Rising up from mourning and loss starts at the moment when, despite everything we have been through, we decide to get up in the morning to go to work and to live our normal lives. This is the first appearance of hope …" (01:17:30)

• Final segment: Hundreds of women gather to sing songs of peace with Yael Dekelbaum, signaling, for the host, how hope is “spreading to our dreams, our prayers and our aspirations to mend the world.” (01:19:00–End)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Ron Gvili’s father (retelling Ron’s words):

  "Do you think that my friends are going to fight alone? I am going to help them." (02:00)

• Lt. Col. Eliashav Varman (on the search for Ron):

  “We exhumed more than 700 slain people from the ground… Suddenly at some point, I see a tear coming from her eye. I see a smile.” (13:30)

• Dr. Esti Sharon:

  "My hands were shaking… A terrible sadness settled over me because that is it, it is final, it is over and he is the last of them… I took off the chain with the hostage pendant I had always had around my neck. I put it in my pocket and that was it. My work was done." (15:00)

• Tali Gvili (Ron’s mother):

  “Ronnie, you went out to defend everyone, and they all deserve your sacrifice. 700 soldiers searched for you. 700 soldiers found you. 700 soldiers brought you home.” (17:30)

• Host on shloshim’s symbolic closure:

  “Now, for the first time in all those 873 days, we can wash our clothes, trim our hair, declare our love, meet friends for drinks and all the rest, which I think is as close to an end of this war that started on October 7, 873 days ago as we are going to have.” (22:30)

• Amos Oz on The Seventh Day:

  “…There is value in putting together a volume trying to give authentic expression to what the people who came back from the war [are] feeling… a small service to the truth.” (31:30)

• Wedding eulogy post-October 7:

  “Maybe these are not all different times. Maybe it all happens together.” (01:04:30)

• Avi Sagi (philosopher):

  "Rising up from mourning and loss starts at the moment when, despite everything we have been through, we decide to get up in the morning to go to work and to live our normal lives. This is the first appearance of hope that after this will spread to our dreams, our prayers and our aspirations to mend the world." (01:17:30)

Suggested Timestamps

• 00:01–08:00 – Life & death of Ron Gvili
• 08:00–15:30 – Search and identification; emotional toll on search/forensic team
• 16:30–20:00 – Funeral, eulogy, communal grief
• 20:00–23:00 – Shloshim tradition; symbolic end to the war
• 24:00–28:00 – War of Independence: frenzied rebuilding, Ben Gurion diary
• 28:00–32:00 – Six-Day War: triumph, but also moral doubts (The Seventh Day)
• 37:00–45:00 – Yom Kippur War: national disillusionment and public protest
• 46:00–55:00 – Lebanon War: rise of grassroots activism; Four Mothers movement
• 58:00–1:04:00 – Social renewal, contradictory emotions, doing and rebuilding
• 01:10:00–01:13:00 – Debates on protest’s role; Gal Hirsch controversy
• 01:13:00–01:20:00 – Return of hope; initiatives, music, and community renewal

Tone and Style

The episode is elegiac, thoughtful, and deeply personal, with an undercurrent of hope and tenderness even amidst loss. The host interweaves personal anecdotes with historical analysis, blending lived experience, communal drama, and philosophical reflection into a soulful meditation on what it means, in Israel, for wars to “end”—or to be survived—and how memory, activism, ritual, and hope characterize the Israeli way of mourning and renewal.