It was Wednesday evening, last night, and I was scrolling through my social media feeds on autopilot, reflexively flinching, squinting and averting my gaze every time a photo or video or illustration of the Bibas children, Ariel and Kfir, or their mother, Shiri, came into view.

It wasn’t just because of the messages put out by the Bibas family requesting that the public not post eulogies or make other parasocial gestures of mourning until they knew, with absolute certainty, the fates of the mother and her two little boys from Kibbutz Nir Oz. I am a firm believer in confirming the facts of a situation before reacting — it is a necessary trait to have as a journalist, possibly an annoying one in a friend or spouse — and I don’t think anyone’s personal sense of sadness or rage trumps the needs of the families of the hostages.

But that wasn’t the only reason I kept looking away.

Since Oct. 7, individual stories have captured and broken the hearts of the Jewish community over and over again, but for many the plight of the Bibas family has been emblematic of what made the Black Sabbath so horrific. A terrified Jewish mother clasping her baby boy and young son to her chest as they are ripped from their home and led off into captivity and an unknown fate is something both deeply familiar and that we never thought we’d see in contemporary times. 

Another trait that possibly makes me a good journalist but a dubious human being is my natural tendency to compartmentalize. You can’t fact-check the details of the crazy things going on in the world right now and remain functional if you engage with every story and subject with an unshielded heart and the full breadth and depth of your emotions. At least I can’t; kudos to you if you can.

So I’ve been editing op-eds and choosing photos and fact-checking and proofreading while, with rare exceptions, averting my heart’s gaze. Recoiling is probably a more honest word. I have a 4-month-old baby at home, and to contemplate the experiences of Shiri Bibas or, even moreso, her little baby, is a third rail to my mind. Don’t touch it.

But in the course of my scrolling, an image arrested my attention. Posted on Facebook by the Israeli media outlet Kan, it was a cartoon illustration by Israeli artist Adva Santo of Batman sitting doubled over on a tree stump while three orange stars shone above him in the dark night sky.

Of course they would get me with Batman. 

I can’t tell you with certainty why Ariel Bibas, who was four years old when he was kidnapped, loved Batman, but I know what drew me to the character and his story as a child: His pursuit of justice. His spirit of vengeance. His protection of the vulnerable. His mission of tikkun olam borne from trauma. His engagement in the struggle between good and evil, darkness and light, not just in the world but also within himself. And of course, his humor (keep in mind that, in the ‘90s, the dark, quippy Batman of “Batman: The Animated Series” reigned supreme). 

When posed the perennial question of “Batman or Superman?”, my answer was not an original one: Superman can fly, has super strength and is a stand-up guy by all accounts, but Batman is a superhero even without super powers (unless you count inherited wealth, which I didn’t as a kid). He equips himself with an amazing arsenal of gadgets and vehicles and turns situations around on the strength of his quick wits and compelling words. His physical prowess and martial arts skills are the product of hard work and years of study conducted with determination and humility.

He is, in short, a self-made superhero; and a self-made superhero is, to a child, something any of us could become. That is undoubtedly part of why it was easy for me to imagine fighting by Batman’s side.

Remembering that feeling opened the pathway in my heart to Ariel Bibas.

Because, knowing that he loved Batman, I can’t believe that at some point in his captivity Ariel didn’t fantasize about Batman coming to save him.

I can viscerally connect with a child who loved Batman, escaping into the world of his imagination to cope with the stress and horror of his reality and imagining fighting alongside the Caped Crusader to rescue himself and his family. POW! CRACK! KA-BOOM!-ing their way to freedom and back home. Different moves, different dialogue, moments of peril and ultimately triumph, over and over again.

Because it is what the child in me would have done.

It sounds perverse, but I hope that Ariel believed he was coming home until the very end. I hope there wasn’t an opportunity for the realization to sink into that small but fierce heart that no Batman, no heroes, were going to save his baby brother. No one was going to save his mom. No one was going to save him.

Because the thought of that moment of loss, the feelings of despair and terror that he might have experienced, shatters my heart to the point of obliteration — I feel it, like breaking glass falling, a thousand shards falling like tears. And the child in me reaches out to save another, to grasp his hand, to at the very least hold his gaze with love at the end. But it’s too late. 

Rachel Kohn is the opinion editor for eJewishPhilanthropy.