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Several people whose relatives were killed or taken hostage in the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, are running for office in Tuesday’s election, the first national vote since the assault, which shook the country’s foundations and ignited its longest war.
The October 2023 assault looms large over this week’s vote. There are sharp divisions over who was to blame for failing to prevent the worst military, intelligence and policy disaster in Israel’s history.
About 1,200 civilians and soldiers were killed that day, according to the Israeli authorities, and roughly 250 were taken hostage to Gaza. Many of the family members of hostages held by Hamas rose to prominence as they campaigned for their loved ones in television interviews and at nationwide protests.
Most of them called for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to take responsibility for the government’s failures of Oct. 7 and to prioritize negotiating the release of the hostages over continued fighting. Others supported Mr. Netanyahu’s right-wing government and urged it to keep up the military pressure on Hamas and Israel’s other enemies.
Parties from across Israel’s political spectrum have recruited candidates from what have become known as the Oct. 7 families. Here are some of the candidates with a chance to win a seat in Parliament:
Shira Shapiro is running with Yashar, the centrist party led by Mr. Netanyahu’s main political rival, Gadi Eisenkot. Ms. Shapiro’s son, Staff Sgt. Aner Shapiro, was on leave from the army on Oct. 7 when he attended the Nova music festival, one of the bloodiest targets of the Hamas-led attack. He took shelter in a crowded roadside bomb shelter and stationed himself by the entrance when gunmen attacked it. As the militants hurled grenades inside, Sergeant Shapiro repeatedly caught the grenades and threw them back out, until he was killed, according to surviving witnesses.
Zvi Mor, the father of a released hostage, Eitan Mor, is running as a candidate for the far-right party Religious Zionism, headed by Bezalel Smotrich. While Eitan was in captivity, Mr. Mor, an educator, founded a forum of right-wing parents of hostages and soldiers who opposed making deals with Hamas and pushed for Israel to defeat the group militarily.
Omri Ronen, a reserve soldier, is running with the left-wing Democrats, led by Yair Golan. His grandmother, Nira Ronen, was killed in her home in Kfar Aza, one of the border communities worst hit in the October 2023 attack, along with her Filipina caregiver, Angelyn Aguirre. Before Oct. 7, Mr. Ronen had been one of the leaders of a grass-roots group of reservists protesting the government’s plan to overhaul the judiciary. He said in a recent television interview that Mr. Netanyahu, whom he called “Mr. Oct. 7,” must go. “The word responsibility has meaning,” he said.
Rafael Ben Shitrit, a former mayor of Beit Shean in northern Israel, is in Yisrael Beitenu, a right-wing opposition party led by Avigdor Liberman. Mr. Ben Shitrit used to belong to Mr. Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party, but abandoned it after his son, Staff Sgt. Elroy Ben Shitrit, was killed in battle on Oct. 7 near the Gaza border. He has been an advocate for an independent state inquiry into what went wrong that day. Mr. Netanyahu has refused such an inquiry, and the opposition parties have pledged to establish one if they are elected.
Sharon Sharabi, also on Yisrael Beitenu’s list of candidates, is the brother of Eli Sharabi, a former hostage who was released from Gaza only to learn that his wife and two teenage daughters had been killed during the Oct. 7 attack. Another brother, Yossi Sharabi, was also taken hostage and killed after 100 days in captivity. Sharon Sharabi campaigned tirelessly for his brothers’ return. When Eli Sharabi was finally released, many Israelis were outraged over how emaciated he looked. “I was shocked,” Sharon said at the time. “I’d been told he would be thin, but I didn’t imagine how thin. It was extreme.”
Tali Gvili, running with Mr. Netanyahu’s Likud party, is the mother of Master Sgt. Ran Gvili, a member of a police counterterrorism unit who was shot and severely wounded in combat on Oct. 7 and then dragged into Gaza. His remains were recovered and returned to Israel in January 2026. The Gvili and Netanyahu families have become close, and the prime minister attended Sergeant Gvili’s state funeral, saying, “Our souls are bound with yours.”
Michal Hirsch Negri is running with Together, a joint slate led by right-wing politician Naftali Bennett and the centrist Yair Lapid. Ms. Hirsch Negri’s son Maj. Roee Negri was killed fighting in Kibbutz Be’eri near the Gaza border on Oct. 7.
Maj. Shahar Varon, a commander in the reserves, is another Together candidate. He fought that day in Kfar Aza, another border community, and later went to fight in Gaza. He was wounded in battle, then went back into Gaza to fight again. “There is life before October 7th, and there is life after,” he wrote recently, adding, “Our government disappeared that morning — but our people showed up instead.”
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