‘Hostage’ is a first-hand account of a hijacking

Hostage by Mimi Nichter; Potomac Books Inc.; (c) 2026; ISBN 16401-26848; 240 pages; $26.95; publication date March 1, 2026

By Rabbi Dr. Michael Leo Samuel in Chula Vista, California

We live in a world where terrorism news hits us constantly, and the long-term scars it leaves—on people, families, whole societies—don’t always make the headlines. That’s why Mimi Nichter’s Hostage: A Memoir of Terrorism, Trauma, and Resilience feels so timely and raw. At just 232 pages, it packs a real punch. It’s her firsthand account of being on TWA Flight 741, hijacked on September 6, 1970—one of the very first big international terrorism incidents in the skies.

Back then, Nichter was just 20, a college kid and anti-war activist heading home to New York after a summer in Israel. She boards the plane like anyone else, and suddenly she’s in the middle of a nightmare. Now, as a retired cultural anthropologist and professor emerita from the University of Arizona, she brings this incredible mix of lived experience and scholarly eye to the story. She doesn’t just recount what happened—she digs into how it messed with her head and heart for decades.

It took over 50 years for her to face this head-on. She calls it “silenced trauma”—that thing where you shove something awful down so deep you almost convince yourself it’s gone. She spent three years piecing it together from old journals, news clips, photos, and a ton of research. What comes out isn’t just “I survived this”; it’s a real look at how untreated fear and grief can quietly rewrite who you are, how you connect with people, how you see the world.

The timing is wild—there’s fresh interest these days in that “Golden Age of Hijackings,” when planes got turned into political weapons. Flight 741 was one of four hit at once by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Most stories zoom in on the politics and drama, but Nichter flips it: this book is about the inside—the fear, the waiting, the slow crawl toward healing. People are already comparing it to heavy hitters like Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning or Edith Eger’s The Choice, and honestly, that feels right.

The book really comes alive when she describes the hijacking. You’re on a normal flight from Tel Aviv through Frankfurt to New York, and bam—armed guys take over and force the plane down to this empty desert strip in Jordan called Dawson’s Field (they renamed it “Revolution Airport”).

She paints it so vividly you can almost feel it:

–The brutal heat trapped in the plane—no AC, no real bathrooms, barely any water.
–That crushing not-knowing: Are we getting out? Are negotiations even happening?
–Weird moments of connection—short talks with the hijackers that show they’re people too, with their own reasons, and even a few acts of unexpected decency.

Things get worse when she’s wrongly pegged as an Israeli soldier. She’s one of 32 passengers kept back and moved to Amman, right as Jordan explodes into Black September civil war. Artillery booming, constant fear of being killed—the hostages are basically bargaining chips in a deadly standoff.

Getting released ended the physical part, but the trauma? That stuck around. Back in college, she tried to act normal—nightmares, jumpy all the time, feeling like safety was a myth. (This was classic PTSD, but the term didn’t even exist yet.) A year later, she and her boyfriend took off on a big backpacking trip through Africa and Asia, chasing some sense of control and freedom. Beautiful in parts, but triggers kept hitting—Munich ’72, Entebbe ’76—and pulling her right back.

It wasn’t until much later that she realized healing meant finally talking about it. The 1970s vibe, especially for women, was basically “keep it together, don’t make a fuss, move on.” She did that for years, until she couldn’t anymore.

Nichter doesn’t go for easy villains or heroes. As an anthropologist, she looks at the hijackers with real nuance—humanizing them without justifying what they did. She notices the cultural stuff, gender dynamics, the bigger Israeli-Palestinian context, and manages to show empathy across lines while still being brutally honest about the terror she felt. That balance turns the book into something deeper: a reflection on how vulnerable we all are when everything goes to hell. Her writing is straightforward and honest—some parts feel almost clinical in observation, others hit you right in the gut. She mixes in journal bits and news snippets, so it feels grounded in real history.

Nichter herself becomes the most moving part of the book: this woman who carried this weight quietly for so long, then found real strength in opening up about it. The sections after the release aren’t as edge-of-your-seat as the hijacking days, but that’s kind of the point—recovery isn’t linear or dramatic; it’s messy and lifelong.

If you’re into the history of terrorism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, trauma and mental health, or just stories about how people rebuild after the worst happens, this one’s essential. Nichter’s voice is brave, kind, and clear-eyed. She connects those explosions from the past to the healing and understanding we’re all still chasing today. I finished it feeling moved—and hopeful.

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Rabbi Dr. Michael Leo Samuel is spiritual leader of Temple Beth Shalom in Chula Vista, California.