At 21 Herzl Street in Acre, a meeting is held every evening at the entrance to the building. A kind of regular and informal custom, in which the Arab and Jewish neighbors go down to the common yard and bring something to snack on. In recent days, they have also become accustomed to the presence of media people, who are asking about Sapir Nahum, the tenant from the second floor, who disappeared last Thursday morning, and as of today (Friday) it is not known what happened to her. Her ex-partner, who she says is the father of her children, and not Robin Khalaila, has been arrested on suspicion of having anything to do with her disappearance.
6 View the gallery
Does not lose hope. Hoodia Tal Azaria, Sapir’s aunt
(Photo: Nahum Segal)
“We are a big puzzle, which is now missing a piece,” says Monai Jamal, 21, who lives here with her mother Naila. “It just looks like there’s a building here with a lot of houses, but actually there’s one big house here. We all know each other’s problems, and everyone helps. If there’s a food problem for someone – we all collect for him. When a neighbor died a year ago, the neighbors edited it all. “The arrangements for the funeral. When Sapir has a financial problem, we go shopping for her, and when my mother underwent foot surgery, Sapir came to check on her when I was at work. That’s how it is with us.”
“This building is special, and people from outside the neighborhood also come to sit with us in the evening,” says Haya Azzam, who lives on the floor below Sapir’s apartment. “She’s a good person, and was our friend. It hurts to see her kids cry, and yesterday they both kept crying. We see them downstairs and also go to their house to see if they need food or money. Her toddler daughter is a little younger than my son, they “There were games and eating together. There is nothing that is worth taking a life for, we pray that an animal will return.”
6 View the gallery
Monai Jamal with a picture of Sapphire
(Photo: Nahum Segal)
The disappearance of Sapir Nahum has turned life around here, and with each passing day, the concern grows. “We all ask God and good luck that nothing happened to her, and she will return alive to her mother and her children,” says Spaa Hatachot, who also lived in the building.
6 View the gallery
The missing person, Sapir Nahum
(Photo: Private)
“Poor thing. We are as scared of her as we are of our children. I see her in the morning when I go to work and she takes the girl to kindergarten. I have lived in this building for 23 years, and all these years everyone lives together. There have never been problems, we have seen neighbors’ children grow and our hearts “When the neighbors ‘son died, we helped in every way possible and we cried with them, and when the neighbors’ girl came home wet from the rain and her mother was not at home, we put her in until the mother returned.”
Is there also a mixed marriage?
Butts: “We live here like we live all over the city, mixed like a salad. My sister’s son had a Jewish friend and he has a daughter from her, they broke up and everyone went their separate ways; the daughter is with her mother and also comes to my sister, speaks Hebrew and Arabic. I know many couples “Like Sapir, in which the mother is Jewish and the father is Arab, this is not the first couple. We only ask God to find her alive, for her children, for herself.”
6 View the gallery
“She’s like my daughter.” Neighbor Naila Khalil
(Photo: Nahum Segal)
“There are a lot of mixed couples in Acre, but we have never heard of such a thing,” says Haya Azzam. “We do not feel there is a difference between us.”
Neighbors gather detail, trying to calm the panic and figure out what happened. You do not need communication here to know, we are explained. Here the doors are closed, but the hearts are open, and everyone knows everything.
Sapir grew up a few blocks from here on Golani Brigade Street, where her mother Susie lives, and where she met who became her partner and the father of her children. She arrived at the building on Herzl Street about two and a half years ago, shortly after the birth of her daughter. Her son is now ten months old. “That morning,” the neighbors say, “Sapir did not feel well, and Susie came and woke her up at seven-thirty to take the girl to kindergarten. Sapir likes to get dressed, but last Thursday she left the house in her pajamas, without a purse and without a phone, because she was sure she would return immediately. “There is no way she would disappear to her children. They are always clean and cared for, and she is the first mother to wait to get them out of kindergarten.”
Neighbors also talk about Susie’s efforts to make a living, efforts that include collecting bottles and cleaning the building’s stairs, and remember how Sapphire came here with a one-week-old baby. “Her partner brought her and asked us to take care of her and take care of her,” says Sage Keys, who lives on the first floor. “We’re all mothers here. And half of us are divorced or widowed.
“We are not neighbors, we are a family. I could have gotten a house from Amidar, but I am not ready to leave these neighbors. I taught Sapir how to take a bath for the girl. She is not one to leave the house or do wrong things. She lives on income security, but she is the first to ask “If you need help. The day before she disappeared, she bought all the children ice cream.”
“The whole neighborhood loves her,” says another neighbor. “There are two entrances here, 15 families at each entrance. There may be more Arabs than Jews, but we are the same thing. Sapir told about the economic difficulties, but did not talk about her spouse. Found her? ”
“Sapir is an amazing mother, she can’t do without her children,” says Bat El Ohayon, a friend of Sapir’s. “We are friends from WIZO’s kindergarten, our daughters were together in kindergarten and our babies at the exact same age, we went through the whole pregnancy together. I have not slept or eaten since I heard about her.”
6 View the gallery
Katie and Sarah, friends of mother Susie
(Photo: Nahum Segal)
Among those crowded at the entrance to the building are Katie Cohen and Sarah Rahav Ribuch, Susie’s friends. “Susie is really exhausted, not standing on her feet,” Cohen shares. “From five in the morning she is knocked on the door to check if Sapir is back, and Sapir’s little one calls ‘Mum, Mum’ all day. We help put the children to sleep, and yesterday no one was able to calm them down anymore. Lucky they were half a day in kindergarten. Sarah brought Susie food “On the eve of the holiday, and yesterday she brought her cigarettes. Susie has not closed her eyes since Sapir disappeared, crying all day and praying to get a sign of what happened to her daughter.”
Aunt Hoodia Tal Azaria comes down from the apartment, and a circle of people is formed around her. “Callers turn to us and say Sapir is not alive,” she shares, “but we do not want to listen to them. We are waiting to hear Sapir.”
Naila Khalil’s phone contains recorded messages in which Sapir is heard asking if she could bring anything from the grocery store, two days before she disappeared. “I did not feel well and Sapir worried me,” she says, “she is like my daughter, she told about all the problems she had, and she did not tell about it. I do not want to hear that she went. We hear about such things in the news, but when it comes to us it is already something Another, and now I’m scared of the rest of my kids. No one deserves such a thing, and especially not her. I’m sitting down waiting for her, I pray she’s get out of the car and get back to us, and I’m mad at her for making us worry like that.
6 View the gallery
Hoodia Tal Azaria and friends of mother Susie
(Photo: Nahum Segal)
“That morning Susie knocked on my door and said she had like a burning fire because Sapphire went with the girl to kindergarten and did not return. I said, it’s only 11:30, maybe she went to her friends, and Susie said she felt something was wrong. At 17:00 I’ve already seen Susie come back from the police with Eden, Sapir’s sister, both crying.
“When I arrived at this building 25 years ago, I had a Jewish neighbor, Esther, who raised the children with me and taught me Hebrew. Sapir understood Arabic, and so did her daughter. In the days of the riots in Acre, this block did not interfere. “If you go to demonstrations. We are a family, and we will continue to eat together and live together.”
Monai Jamal posted a Facebook post this week with a picture of Sapphire taken at the nearby beach, writing: “Both we and the children are waiting for you. We are full of hope that you will return safe and sound.”
“Tonight I dreamed she was alive,” she says, “I saw her in an abandoned building, tied to a chair, and I told her ‘I knew you were alive.’ Surviving on her own, wanting to make a living and about to start working as a security guard, she got where she went. Is she suffering? Does she have anything to eat? Is she even alive?
“I work at MDA and study health systems management at Netanya College, and in recent days I have had heart palpitations whenever there is an incident with concern for human life. I’m afraid to get to the place and see that it is her. I want to remember her sitting at the entrance on the floor with the children of the building, smiling as in the pictures. ”