Avida Bachar lost his wife, his 15-year-old son, and one of his legs in Hamas’s massacre on Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7.

Like many other left-wing Israelis, he also no longer holds left-wing views about his Arab neighbors. But Bachar went a step further than many others, realizing that his former political views were not only faulty but came at the expense of his fellow Jews. As YWN reported in December, Bachar even said that it’s lucky that the October 7 massacre happened at Be’eri and not in Gush Etzion, saying: “I would have said, ‘Why do they live there?’ I might have said, ‘They deserve it.’ I would have said all the worst things in the world.”

Recently, Bachar warned that the danger terror groups pose to yishuvim in Yehuda and Shomron is much deeper than the Israeli public is willing to believe, saying that the situation is much more similar to the situation in Gaza than we imagine.

Speaking in an interview with TOV, Bacher said, referring to Palestinians in Gaza: “Take their land away. Take their land, don’t blink. Push them into Egypt…And if you think it’s better in Yehudah and Shomron? The answer is no. I’ll tell you a secret – under the hospital in Jenin there are exactly the same tunnels as under Shifa [hospital in Gaza]. Exactly the same. We’re burying our heads in the sand right now. They say: ‘No, it can’t be, we’re in control of the situation.'”

“You don’t know when it will be, you have no idea. Because always remember that a volcano will erupt again. When? You won’t know. But it will happen. I’m telling you it will happen if we don’t get rid of them.”

“I suffered endless torture in the bomb shelter for 12 hours. Next to me was my wife, who was murdered in the afternoon, and my son who was murdered around 4:30 p.m. I am a leftist who has been betrayed. A betrayed leftist is a murderer. He doesn’t see clearly. He has no compassion for anything. That’s what happened to me on October 7 – I turned into a betrayed leftist and I have zero compassion for anyone.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)