When several dozen people gathered at the Kennedy Center for a yoga class overlooking the Potomac River on Oct. 8, the class began with a practice familiar to anyone who regularly does yoga: intention setting. 

The class was called “Yoga for Carmel,” in honor of Carmel Gat, a 40-year-old Israeli yoga instructor who was taken captive by Hamas from Kibbutz Be’eri on Oct. 7 and killed last year alongside five other hostages, including Hersh Goldberg-Polin. Among those taking part in the class were former hostages and the family members of those still being held in Gaza, all of whom had gathered at the same spot a day earlier for a somber event marking two years since the attacks that reshaped their lives. 

“What do you do in yoga? You set your intention. You think about the release of the hostages. That’s all we thought about during the entire yoga session,” recalled Matan Sivek, who until last month was the director of the Hostage Families Forum’s U.S. operation. As soon as the class ended, a cacophony of cellphones began ringing as news broke about a possible deal.

“At 6 p.m., we got the news that the deal might be happening, that it’s evolving super rapidly,” said Sivek. Soon it was confirmed: Israel and Hamas had agreed to a ceasefire that would result in the release of all the hostages and an end to the war. The news capped off an emotional 36 hours, which began with the Oct. 7 memorial event at the Kennedy Center a day earlier. 

Sivek sat down with Jewish Insider last week for a wide-ranging conversation reflecting on the two-year-long advocacy campaign — spearheaded by Sivek, his wife Bar Ben-Yaakov and leading Jewish organizations including the American Jewish Committee and Schusterman Family Philanthropies — demanding the release of the more than 250 people taken hostage by Hamas during the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks. 

“I’m very happy that I am part of something that was successful at the end. There are many initiatives and nonprofits around the world who try to solve different issues, and they will never solve them. People try to end famine. They try to find a medicine for cancer. They try to stop addiction,” said Sivek. “For us, it’s something that you can say, ‘Wow, we really saved lives.’”

Advocating for the hostages was a task that Sivek and Ben-Yaakov took on almost by accident, but they ultimately became the address for Israeli hostage families who came to Washington to advocate for the release of their loved ones. The couple helped arrange meetings with Democratic and Republican lawmakers, officials in the Biden and Trump administrations and political and faith leaders around the country. Their strategy was to meet with anyone who would listen.

“We really were here to say that this humanitarian issue transcends all politics, and this was our strategy from Day One,” said Sivek.

It made sense, then, that the moment when President Donald Trump shared with the families that the hostages would be coming the following Monday — five days after that yoga class — was in a phone call to the hostage families as they stood in Sivek and Ben-Yaakov’s Georgetown living room. A video of the call, placed by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who put Trump on speakerphone, quickly went viral and appeared on news broadcasts around the world.

“President Trump, you have the best crowd in the world,” Lutnick said into the phone. 

Everyone in the room shouted together, smiles on their faces: “Thank you!” 

“You just take care of yourselves. The hostages will come back. They’re all coming back on Monday,” Trump said. Among those in the room were released hostages Keith Siegel, Iair Horn, Doron Steinbecher and Arbel Yehoud, as well as family members of Gali and Ziv Berman and Omri Miran, who at the time were still in Gaza, along with Horn’s brother Eitan and Yehoud’s partner Ariel Cunio. 

“This is the moment when the world realized the timing of the release of the hostages,” said Sivek.

The White House deputy press secretary, Anna Kelly, told JI this week that Trump was deeply affected by the story of the hostages.

“President Trump is always motivated to end human suffering around the world, and he was horrified by the images of Oct. 7 and the capture of innocent Americans, Israelis and others taken hostage by Hamas,” said Kelly.

Within the Trump administration, Lutnick was working behind the scenes on behalf of the hostages. His wife, Allison, was the driving force behind his advocacy. 

Allison Lutnick had gotten to know many of the families after a trip to Israel early last year, when she met the mother of Omer Shem Tov, a hostage who was freed in February. Allison then connected with Sivek when she moved to Washington this year, and soon after he facilitated a meeting between the Lutnicks and several freed hostages at the Lutnicks’ apartment in Miami. 

“We spent three three hours together in our apartment talking and sharing. They spoke of the horrors of what they’d been through and we spoke of the horrors of what we had been through 24 years earlier on 9/11,” she told JI on Wednesday. At the time, Howard Lutnick was the CEO of the financial firm Cantor Fitzgerald, which lost 658 employees on 9/11, including his brother Gary. 

“There was definitely a bond between all of us, having experienced a terrorist attack and the loss of loved ones and horrible trauma,” she added. “Howard and I felt this very deep connection with them and what they were going through. We had an understanding of it.”

Whenever Sivek asked, Allison Lutnick texted leading administration officials like Vice President JD Vance, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth directly to set up meetings for them with hostage families. The Lutnicks’ family foundation supported the Sukkah of Hope at the Kennedy Center, where the Oct. 7 commemoration event took place. (The sukkah was supposed to be set up on the Ellipse, outside the White House, but the government shutdown scuttled that plan. So Allison Lutnick, a Kennedy Center board member, reached out to the center’s president, Ric Grenell — and, thus, it was moved there.) 

She and her husband both spoke at the memorial event, and that morning in the sukkah, a majority of Trump administration cabinet secretaries gathered for a breakfast with the hostage families. 

“We are part of you. We are with you, and we will help get them home,” Howard Lutnick said in a speech. Less than 36 hours later, there was a breakthrough in the deal.

“The two-year anniversary of Oct. 7 was a day of intense emotion, sadness, mourning and disbelief and horror that it’s been two years. And then the next day, Oct. 8, was this incredible elation. It just couldn’t have been more different,” Allison Lutnick said. “It was extraordinary to walk into Matan’s house later that night and celebrate with the families. It was the first time I’d ever seen them smile for a picture.”

She and her husband arrived at the impromptu celebration with two bottles of champagne. Meanwhile, Lisa Eisen and Stacy Schusterman, the president and the chair of Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies, showed up with food for 30. They had been planning to host Sivek’s family and all the hostage families for Sukkot that night — Eisen and her husband had purchased a larger sukkah in preparation — but the gathering never happened.

“I called Lisa. I was like, ‘Lisa, you worked so hard for this dinner, but I think we cannot make it.’ And it was 6 p.m. At 7 we were supposed to be there,” Sivek said. “I was like, ‘A deal is happening. I cannot take them from the city. They need to stay here.’” 

“I said, ‘Well, this is the best excuse ever to not come,’” Eisen recounted to JI. She and her family sat down to eat, toasted the hostages and said the Shehechiyanu prayer, expecting to have a much smaller dinner at home. Then Sivek asked her to come celebrate with them.

“So we packed up all of the food for 30 people, and we drove down to Matan and Bar’s house, and we set up the meal because they had no food,” said Eisen, who split the cooking with her husband: three kinds of soup (coconut lentil, red lentil and matzoh ball), schnitzel, salads, homemade hummus, pies and cakes. “It was one of the most powerful, moving, beautiful moments. And I have to say, Matan and Bar, it wouldn’t happen without them. They were so tireless.” 

It was in that environment with hugging and crying and eating — critical to any Jewish event — that everyone realized this deal, finally, seemed to be real.

“This is how our kitchen became famous,” Sivek said with a laugh. “For us it was some sort of closure as well, the fact that after two very difficult years, the announcement came from our kitchen.”

Almost immediately, Sivek and his partners began booking the Israelis on flights back home; less than a week later, they would be reunited with their loved ones. It was a moment these Israelis had hardly dared to imagine during the agony of the preceding two years. In that period, their pain was shared by Jews around the world, who wore dog tags and yellow ribbon pins to constantly remind others of the people imprisoned in Gaza.

“Many people view this as a miracle that happened, that they’re out, and of course, it seemed like a miracle. But there was a lot of work of hostage families and former hostages behind the scenes to make it happen,” Sivek said. “I think that the Jewish people should be very, very proud of themselves, that we stood by our people, and we actually managed to save their lives.” 

Artist and curator Josef Palermo has lived in Washington for nearly two decades, but he wasn’t aware that the Kennedy Center had an Israeli lounge until he joined the venerable cultural institution as its curator of visual arts and special programming this summer. 

The Israeli Lounge has been underutilized in recent decades and largely unknown, even among the many Jewish patrons of the arts at the Kennedy Center. Yitzhak Rabin, then Israel’s ambassador to the United States, dedicated the lounge — a small room designed to visually tell the history of Jewish and Israeli music — as Israel’s gift to the United States in 1971, when the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opened its doors alongside the Potomac River. 

Now, the walls of the Israeli Lounge are covered with paintings by American-Israeli artist Marc Provisor as part of a special monthlong exhibit commemorating the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks in Israel. Provisor’s son survived the Nova music festival, and the paintings are meant to bear witness to the brutality of what happened there. 

The exhibit, the opening of which was tied to the two-year anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks, marks the beginning of what Kennedy Center leaders say is an institutional commitment to combating antisemitism through the arts, first and foremost by spotlighting the works and contributions of Jewish artists. 

“This will not be the last time that we see some work related to antisemitism, or just celebrating the Jewish American community experience,” Palermo, who curated the Oct. 7 exhibit, told Jewish Insider in an interview last week. 

The Kennedy Center’s decision to focus resources on countering antisemitism comes at a time when many other institutions in the arts have joined cultural boycotts of Israel, or distanced themselves from Israeli artists amid the war in Gaza. In September, a Belgian music festival rescinded an invitation to the Munich Philharmonic because it was being led by an Israeli conductor. The Israel Philharmonic faced demonstrations outside Carnegie Hall during a four-day run of performances in New York this month. 

“Having this show in this space, the Israeli Lounge, I think affirms the Kennedy Center’s commitment to standing against other institutions [who are] joining a cultural boycott of Israel, on the basis that we are going to be defenders of free speech,” said Palermo. “Our leader of the Kennedy Center, Amb. [Richard] Grenell, has made clear that this is a place where all views are welcome. All people are welcome. And art has long been a domain to have these sorts of difficult discussions and conversations.” 

The Kennedy Center has been under fire from many in the art world this year amid President Donald Trump’s takeover of the institution. He removed all of former President Joe Biden’s appointees from the board and fired the center’s president, who held the role during the first Trump administration. The Kennedy Center has since faced censure from liberal critics, with some going so far as to boycott the institution. Several artists and musicians have canceled shows, and the hit musical “Hamilton” called off its planned 2026 run at the Kennedy Center in protest. 

Bonnie Glick, who joined the Kennedy Center this summer as senior director of individual giving and corporate relations with the goal of raising money for its antisemitism-focused programs, told JI she is not worried about the Jewish-related programming being viewed as political. 

“This is solidarity. It is not political,” said Glick. “It is the Kennedy Center, an apolitical institution, standing with the Jewish community and standing with Israel as well.” 

Grenell served as a diplomat and foreign policy advisor during Trump’s first administration, and was appointed by Trump in February as interim executive director of the Kennedy Center. A spokesperson for the Kennedy Center declined to make Grenell available for an interview but underscored that fighting antisemitism will remain an institutional priority. “It is increasingly important that America’s cultural center serves as a place where antisemitism is countered through thoughtful programming and events — a space that welcomes everyone,” said Roma Daravi, vice president of public relations. 

One of the only mainstage programs that stayed in place once Grenell was tapped to lead the institution was a production of “Parade,” the award-winning musical by Alfred Uhry about the 1915 lynching of Leo Frank, a Jewish industrialist who was killed after being wrongly convicted for the murder of a 13-year-old white girl. Robert Kraft’s Foundation to Combat Antisemitism, recently renamed the Blue Square Alliance Against Hate, helped underwrite the cost of the production. After the performances, viewers walked past a display with blue square pins — the organization’s signature item — along with material about its work fighting antisemitism. 

“We hadn’t worked with them before, but knowing their strategic focus on this issue got us really, really energized as a different way to distribute our message and ultimately raise awareness and empathy on this topic,” Blue Square Alliance’s president, Adam Katz, told JI. “Given their willingness to be bold and be innovative and take on this challenge, we’re excited to see if there could be other future collaboration opportunities that could benefit both what they’re trying to achieve and what we’re trying to achieve.” 

Glick also locked down a gift from former Paramount Chair Shari Redstone, whose family foundation sponsored the Oct. 7 exhibit.

“Our foundation was glad to support this vital remembrance of the terror of Oct. 7 and the agonizing experiences of the hostages and their families,” Redstone told JI in a statement. “We will continue to speak with the Kennedy Center about ways to educate audiences about the Jewish experience as a means of addressing antisemitism and promoting understanding and unity.”

Many of the Kennedy Center projects in the works about Jewish culture will be tied to a yearlong celebration of America’s 250th birthday, with special programs and performances scheduled throughout 2026. One of those, from the Kennedy Center’s director of music programming, Sammy Miller, will look at the influence of Jewish cantors who immigrated from Eastern Europe on American composers such as George Gershwin. 

“There’s a very tangible connection between Jewish contributions to the arts in America and the celebration of America,” said Glick, who served in the first Trump administration as deputy USAID administrator. 

Other possible programs include stand-up comedy from Jewish comedians, performances by Jewish collegiate a cappella groups and acts by Israeli musicians. Earlier this month, the Kennedy Center’s REACH Pavilion played host to the Sukkah of Hope, which highlighted the plight of the hostages who remained in Gaza — the first sukkah ever built at the Kennedy Center. It was supported by the family foundation of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and his wife, Allison.

“We care that the Kennedy Center is taking up this mandate to combat antisemitism through the arts as a way to signal to other sister performing arts organizations that not only is antisemitism not tolerated here, boycotts of Israel are not tolerated here, and joyful promotion of Jewish contributions to the arts absolutely are promoted here,” said Glick.

The Oct. 7 exhibit by Marc Provisor is on display at the Kennedy Center until Nov. 7.

Oct. 7 bloomed warm and sunny in Washington this year as dozens of Jewish community leaders and bipartisan political officials gathered somberly at a pavilion at the Kennedy Center to mark two years since the Hamas terror attacks in Israel. 

A large sukkah, deemed the “Sukkah of Hope,” had a simple message displayed: “Two years in captivity. We can bring them home,” with photos of the 48 people, living and dead, still held captive by Hamas in Gaza. Several former hostages and the family members of those still in Gaza walked up to the stage inside the sukkah, one after the other, all with variations on the same message: Thank you, President Trump, they said. Bring our loved ones home. 

“President Trump, we are thankful for what you’ve done, for your determination, for the time and energy you’ve given to this cause,” said Liran Berman, whose twin brothers, Gali and Ziv, remain in Gaza. 

“We are really grateful and hopeful. I’m glad that this man, Donald Trump, is behind us,” said Iair Horn, who in February returned to Israel after 498 days in Hamas captivity. His younger brother, Eitan, is still being held in Gaza.

Their appeal to the president’s dealmaking prowess came after the Hostages and Missing Families Forum nominated Trump for a Nobel Peace Prize, an honor he has long coveted. The president sent a letter to the former hostages and the hostage families early Tuesday thanking them for the nomination and expressing his commitment “to returning all the hostages home, and ensuring the total destruction of Hamas so these horrific acts may never be repeated.” 

The Sukkah of Hope was supposed to be constructed on the Ellipse, outside the White House. But the government shutdown meant that could not happen. Still, its move to the Kennedy Center did not keep high-level government officials from visiting. 

Before the memorial service, several Cabinet secretaries had breakfast with the former hostages and hostage family members. In attendance were Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. 

Ronen Neutra, whose son Omer was killed on Oct. 7 and whose body is being held hostage by Hamas, said the Cabinet members sounded optimistic about the possibility of a deal. 

“We are hearing from the Cabinet members their optimism that we might be getting closer to a deal,” Neutra said. “But I think what is more important for us, or as important, is to hear the commitment that [we] have been hearing from President Trump, that this has to happen, and this is on his top priority list, and I think it trickles down.” 

Lutnick and his wife, Allison, supported the creation of the sukkah through their family foundation. 

“Donald Trump is the driving force of peace in this world,” Lutnick said at the memorial event. “The United States of America is together with the hostages and the hostage families. We are part of you, we are with you and we will help get them home.”

In the crowd at the event were Noa Argamani, Edan Alexander, Keith Siegel, Arbel Yehoud, Doron Steinbrecher and Ilana Gritzewsky, all of whom survived Hamas captivity. Alexander, a dual U.S.-Israeli citizen, and the Neutra family met with Trump at the White House on Tuesday afternoon. 

At the memorial, several outlined the torture they face and they fears they harbor for loved ones who remain in Gaza. 

“There are no words in any language to describe what I went through,” said Yehoud, whose partner, Ariel Cunio, 28, remains in Gaza. “Even as I stand here before you, I’m not really there. A massive part of me is still there, trapped in that darkness, and I will remain there until my Ariel and everyone comes home.”