By Adam Levi, HDNA Boger, Rakaz of Hechalutz

Wanted to let everyone abroad know that I am currently safe at home in Akko. All of us in the north are currently watching the developments on the border with Lebanon with restless anticipation, hoping and praying that another front to this war will not be opened. The situation here is infuriating and devastating and I could probably fill a book with all of my thoughts on what is going on here. However, for now, there is one thing I feel I need to share.

Yesterday I received the news that Vivian Silver had been reported missing. This past Saturday Vivian's home, Kibbutz Be'eri, was invaded by Hamas forces. The group ran through the kibbutz murdering and capturing men, women, children, and the elderly. According to the latest reports, at least 100 people on the kibbutz were killed and the number is assumed to be higher. The last we know, Vivian was communicating with family members when the terrorists forced themselves into her home. Since then her phone has been dead and her body has not been identified. It is assumed that she has been taken captive and is currently being held by Hamas in Gaza.

Vivian is an old friend of my parents from Kibbutz Gezer. She was born and raised in Winnipeg, Canada and as a student at the University of Manitoba in the late 60s joined a group from Habonim that planned to move to Israel together. After finishing her degree, Vivian moved to New York with the group to recruit new members. While there she was integral in launching the Jewish feminist movement. In 1974 her group moved to Israel to (re)establish Kibbutz Gezer. My mother arrived on the kibbutz only a few years later.

I have only met Vivian a handful of times, but even before I did I knew from my mother that Vivian is "the real thing." A committed kibbutz member, a life-long peace activist, and an ardent feminist. In her almost 50 years in Israel Vivian has managed to do what many idealistic Anglo olim struggled to do; become deeply entrenched in Israeli society and finding the way to bring those values you brought with you to life in reality. She was central in the establishing of the Kibbutz Movement's Department to Advance Gender Equality, served as the Executive Director of NISPED - the Negev Institute of Strategies of Peace and Development, served on the board of the New Israel Fund and has dedicated much of her life from retirement onwards building the Women Wage Peace movement.

Since hearing the news of Vivian's capture I have not been able to calm myself. The injustice of what has happened to her is so overwhelming, so utterly unimaginable, that I can't do anything but scream it out to the world. And then I remember, she is just one of the 150 Israelis that are currently being held hostage in Gaza. She is just one of the now thousands of Israelis who have been murdered, kidnapped, and wounded. Only one story of so many.

I thank the many people who have reached out to me and I pray for the return of Vivian and all the captives currently being held by Hamas in Gaza. I urge all of you - at least in this moment - to stop, mourn, and condemn.

If you are unable to look at this and condemn it without caveats, I am afraid you have lost your humanity.

If you are unwilling to accept that those who did this made an active and real choice to do so, and that they could have chosen differently, you deny us all our humanity.

And if you are still hiding behind the claim that one can never criticize "the right of the oppressed to resist," you are a coward.