Daily Kickoff
Good Monday morning. It is the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks on Israel.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we talk to residents of the Israeli kibbutzim that were attacked a year ago today, and look at how the anniversary of the attacks is playing out on elite American college campuses. We also talk to legislators and Jewish communal leaders about domestic efforts to fight antisemitism and threats from abroad to Israel and the U.S. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, Marc Rowan and Rep. Josh Gottheimer.
What We’re Watching
- Communities, organizations and government officials around the world will mark the anniversary of the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks today.
- In Washington, President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden will be joined by Rabbi Aaron Alexander, a senior rabbi at Adas Israel Congregation, and participate in a yahrzeit candlelighting ceremony at 11:45 a.m. ET at the White House.
- Vice President Kamala Harris will mark the anniversary of the attacks at her Naval Observatory residence at 4 p.m. ET, where she’ll plant a memorial tree along with Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff and deliver remarks. Earlier in the day, Emhoff will attend the American Jewish Committee’s National October 7 Memorial Commemoration in Washington.
- Former President Donald Trump will mark the anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks in Miami, with an event for Jewish leaders at his Doral golf club. The event will “honor the 1,200 lives lost” and “remember the victims of antisemitic violence.” Trump is also reportedly scheduled to visit the Ohel, in Queens, New York, this morning, where the Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson is buried.
- Vice presidential candidate Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), will mark the day at a noon event hosted by the Philos Project on the National Mall.
- House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) is commemorating the day at a Republican Jewish Coalition event in Las Vegas.
- In New York, Israel’s U.N. mission will hold a memorial event at 3 p.m. Speakers include U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield; Rabbi Doron Perez, whose son Daniel was killed on Oct. 7 and whose body is still being held in Gaza; and Sigal Mansouri, whose daughters Roya and Norel were murdered at the Nova music festival. Israeli singer Eden Golan will perform her Eurovision entry, “Hurricane,” at the ceremony.
- The Israeli Embassy in Washington will hold a memorial event at 2 p.m.
- Tonight, the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington will hold an evening of remembrance at The Anthem in Washington.
- Reps. Kathy Manning (D-NC), Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), Brad Schneider (D-IL) and Haley Stevens (D-MI) will join the Jewish Democratic Council of America for a virtual community gathering at noon.
- The American Enterprise Institute is holding a discussion featuring AEI senior fellow Danielle Pletka, the Council on Foreign Relations’ Elliott Abrams, Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies David A. Deptula and former Israeli National Security Advisor Eyal Hulata, now a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
What You Should Know
Just over a year ago, Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Square was the site of some heated and at times physical confrontations between secular and religious Israelis over gender-segregated prayer in public spaces. But just over a week after clashes marred the Yom Kippur holiday, the square became the site of a vigil that has never ended, for a people who have yet to be able to close one of the darkest chapters in their recent history, Jewish Insider Executive Editor Melissa Weiss reports.
Fresh photos of hostages, fallen soldiers and Oct. 7 victims are interspersed among faded images that line the fountain. Memorial candles flicker in the breeze. Standing solo and in groups, people pause in front of pictures and stuffed animals, some quietly wiping away tears.
Scenes like this will play out across Israel and the world today. Across Israel’s south, individual communities that bore the brunt of Hamas’ attacks will hold private memorial ceremonies.
Outside Kibbutz Reim, at the site of the Nova music festival, approximately 1,000 people — mainly family and friends of those murdered at the party — gathered at the site before dawn for the one-year anniversary of the massacre, eJewishPhilanthropy’s Judith Sudilovsky reports.
A heavy silence hung in the air, broken at times by a wail and by the pounding of not-too-distant artillery cannons, at 6:29 a.m. this morning — the moment when one year ago today Hamas launched its deadly assault on southern Israel, first with a barrage of rockets and mortar shells, followed by a mass border breach.
Before the service and afterward, they gathered at the makeshift memorial that has been built at the site, lighting candles and saying prayers at the photograph-topped markers for each of the 364 people who were murdered at the festival. Some had visited the area several times before, while others were there for the first time.
“I come here every two weeks,” Moti Harlev, whose 41-year-old daughter, Hila Keylin, came to the festival to celebrate her Oct. 5 birthday, told eJP. “This is the last place where she enjoyed herself. And because of that I come here,” said Harlev, who came with his family, including three of Keylin’s four children. (The youngest, 9, stayed home.) “We help her children as much as we can. They came here today, but I’m not sure it is good for them.”
A year after the attacks, Israelis are still unable to properly mourn the losses of their loved ones. A memorial event organized by families of Oct. 7 victims that was expected to draw tens of thousands of attendees to Tel Aviv’s HaYarkon park this evening was forced to cancel most of the tickets over safety concerns following Iran’s ballistic missile attack last week and Hezbollah’s ongoing firing of rockets and missiles.
For the friends and families of the 101 remaining hostages, today brings added grief. Those whose loved ones were killed on Oct. 7 and then taken to Gaza, or who were killed in captivity, face the indignity of being denied the ability to grieve their loved ones according to Jewish custom.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum announced this morning the confirmed death of hostage Idan Shtivi, who was believed to have been killed at the Nova music festival, where he was a photographer. Shtivi’s body was taken to Gaza, where it remains among the bodies of dozens of other Israelis whose families are unable to bury their loved ones.
And across the U.S., events and vigils meant to punctuate the end of this dark year will face added security threats. The FBI and Department of Homeland Security issued a statement in advance of the anniversary, warning against the possibility of extremist violence without citing any specific threats.
President Joe Biden released a statement marking the day, saying that last October’s attack “brought to the surface painful memories left by millennia of hatred and violence against the Jewish people.” Biden also stated his belief “that history will also remember October 7th as a dark day for the Palestinian people because of the conflict that Hamas unleashed that day.”“
On this day of remembrance,” Biden concluded, “which also falls during the holiest days of the Jewish calendar, we honor the indomitable spirit of the Jewish people and mourn the victims of October 7th. May their memory be a blessing.”
one year on
‘I mark Oct. 7 every day’

In the first weeks of the war last fall, reporters in Israel were given access to the kibbutzim and Nova music festival site when the entire Gaza border area was still considered an active military zone. On a day that reporters were taken to Kibbutz Nir Oz last October, Hadas Calderon guided them through her ex-husband’s home and traced her children’s efforts to evade Hamas. Nearly a year later, reporters were again given access to the sites of Hamas’ deadly massacre. Some of the locations have been cleaned up and sanitized for the many solidarity missions that have traveled to the region over the last year. Others were private homes that members of the press were given special permission to enter, Jewish Insider’s Melissa Weiss reports from the Gaza Envelope.
One year later: The Calderon house, like all the others on its block, sits empty. A layer of dust has settled on the sturdy wooden furniture that Ofer Calderon built for his home in Kibbutz Nir Oz. On the morning of Oct. 7, Calderon and two of his four children were awakened by Hamas terrorists in their neighborhood and attempted to hide, rushing out the back of their home, through a window and into the bushes before they were captured. Sahar and Erez Calderon were taken with their father, released a month and a half later in the agreement that freed most of the child hostages. Ofer remains in captivity in Gaza. Their mother, Hadas, survived the attack on the other side of the kibbutz; her mother and niece were killed. On the front door are posters of Ofer and his children. Peeking through a broken window, one can see that the house has been largely cleared out — all that remains in the living area are a couch, tables and chairs. The shattered glass, scattered papers and household items that littered the floors after the home was ransacked by terrorists were cleaned up months ago. The only item on the wooden kitchen table is a mug with the word toda — “thank you” — that had survived that day and all the days since.
Hostage forum: In The Wall Street Journal, former hostage Sahar Calderon calls for her father’s release from Hamas captivity, while in The New York Times, 86-year-old Yaffa Adar recalls her time in captivity.