Two years after the tragic deaths of hostages Alon Shamriz, Yotam Haim, and Samer Talalka, who were shot to death by an IDF unit in error after escaping their captors, their extraordinary story of escape has become a feature film, Stay Forte, that will be released throughout Israel on Thursday.
The film stars Shahar Tavoch, Tomer Machloof, and Wael Hamdun as the three escaped hostages, and American actors Judd Hirsch and Selma Blair have small roles.
Stay Forte's story is about Shamriz, 26, an engineering student, Haim, 28, a drummer for the heavy metal band Persephore, who were kidnapped from Kibbutz Kfar Aza, and Talalka, 24, who lived in Hura, and was taken hostage from Kibbutz Nir Am.
On December 15, 2023, 70 days after the hostages' abduction and five days after their escape, the three men died when IDF soldiers shot at them as they approached, believing they were a moving threat. Shamriz and Talalka were killed instantly, while Haim was wounded and fled into a nearby house. He shouted in Hebrew, “I’m a hostage, you’re killing me,” but the soldiers still did not hear or recognize him.
In a report about the film on Keshet 12 News broadcast over the weekend, the families and director Doron Eran spoke about how the hostages’ relatives were involved in the project from the beginning. The movie was filmed in Georgia, where Russians built a tunnel network in World War II that the filmmakers discovered was similar to the 500-kilometer-plus tunnels Hamas built under Gaza, where the many hostages were held.
Film immortalizes escaped hostages’ heroism
As the families stepped into the tunnel in Georgia during their visit to the set, they were shaken, as the Keshet report shows. “It’s terribly hard, hard to breathe,” said Shamriz’s father, Avi Shamriz. “I tried to imagine myself in Alon’s place or one of the hostages down there. I don’t know if I could have survived that long.”
Wichian Temthong, a Thai citizen who had been working in Israel and who was released in the first hostage deal, was held with the three victims nearly until their escape, and his testimony helped bring this story to the screen.
Eran, who undertook a six-month investigation into the incident, said, “The basis for the film is the testimony of the Thai hostage, Wichian Temthong, who was with the three almost until the escape. Many people don’t know that there was another hostage with them for most of the time… his story is a tale of heroism by three hostages, who, for me, are partisans in every sense; they managed to escape. They wandered for five days in Saje’iya, trying to reach the IDF and come home.”
The movie gives a background on the victims. Shamriz had served in the elite IDF Yahalom unit and was familiar with the tunnels. “You can see that Alon really wanted to plan how to escape. He seemed to know what to do, how the tunnels were built. He talked about it all the time [according to testimony by Temthong],” said Tomer Machloof, the actor who portrayed Shamriz in the movie.
In the Keshet report, Avi Shamriz described the moment his son crossed the Gaza neighborhood alone, unseen: “Imagine for a moment a person is in Saje’iya moving 1,200 meters across the area, while on one side Hamas is hunting them because they escaped, and on the other IDF soldiers think they are terrorists… and all the time you see the survival actions of the three.”
A scene from the film shows how the trio used survival tactics: they removed their shirts, held a white flag, and hung an SOS sign. A tracking dog from the Israeli special unit even found them, and the filmed footage was later released to the families.
Alon’s brother, Yonatan Shamriz, told Keshet: “On one hand, it’s a terrible disappointment, but on the other hand, there’s an enormous pride. Enormous pride that my brother was free for five days, and died free and not in captivity.”
Iris Haim, Yotam’s mother, said, “I’m proud. I’m leaving here with great pride. I truly see this as super-important documentation for our country and for the nations of the world, which understand the most important thing: that our children are the greatest heroes, not victims. So, I’m leaving here today with a good feeling.”
“In the end, there was an internal goal of immortalizing the person and giving him his place in life, even after his death,” said Talalka’s father, Fouad Talalka.