Adi Marciano to her daughter Noa: You never taught me how to be a bereaved mother

Adi Marciano, mother of the late IDF lookout Noa Marciano, dedicated her address at the national memorial ceremony organized by Kumu and the October 7 Families to her daughter, who was abducted alive on October 7 and murdered in captivity. Through her personal tribute to Noa, she also gave voice to the pain of other families whose loved ones were taken alive into Gaza, only to be returned for burial. “My beloved Noa, for 19 years you taught me what it meant to be a mother, but you never taught me what it meant to be a bereaved mother," Marciano said. “You never taught me how to be the mother of a daughter who was taken from us and never came back alive." Marciano recalled her final conversation with her daughter on that fateful Shabbat and spoke of the other female soldiers and observers stationed alongside her. “Like me, the mothers of the 17 lookouts murdered that Shabbat, when we spoke for the last time, were never taught either." She then broadened her remarks to honor all hostages who were taken alive but killed before they could be saved. “And like you, another 45 hostages, men and women, were abducted alive, but never had the chance to come home," she said. Marciano described the agonizing months the hostages endured and the false hope their families held onto in Israel. “They held on for weeks and months in the darkness and fear, clinging to life and waiting for someone to save them. And all that time, their families waited by the phone, by the door, imagining the moment of reunion, the embrace… But the opportunities were missed." Concluding her address, Marciano connected her personal loss to the shared grief of the hostage families: “We did not get our loved ones back alive. We received them for eternal rest, gaining a new family in the process: the family of bereavement." The ceremony paid tribute to the 46 hostages who were taken alive on October 7 and were either murdered by Hamas in captivity or mistakenly killed during military operations. Summarizing the tragedy, ceremony host Shani Cohen added: “The hands that reached out from the darkness asking for help came back empty. They were not brought home alive. They were brought back for burial."