Israeli hostage Andrei Koslov remembers being rescued from Hamas captivity

Now he’s back in Israel with his folks, trying to make sense of the ordeal and advocating for other hostages still held in Gaza. “I think I was a really lucky guy,” he said, adding that when he recalled his experience, it felt different. “I think I’m healthy, but some emotions are off.”

The rescue operation, carried out in a crowded group under blazing sunlight, was one of the deadliest and most dramatic of the conflict. Hundreds of Israeli soldiers trained for months in an effort to rescue Kozlov, 27, and three alternative hostages: Shlomi Ziv, Almog Meir Jan and Noa Argamani.

But when the raid was underway and their getaway car was stopped, a fierce battle with Hamas fighters was required. Israeli warplanes bombed the camp forcing them to resign. More than 270 Palestinians were killed in the bombing, according to the Gaza State Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and opponents, but says the majority of those killed in the conflict are women and children.

Kozlov noted that he laughed and cried as he boarded the helicopter that would take them home, and watched from the window as Gaza’s sandy beaches, concrete structures and giant tent cities disappear on the horizon.

“Real superheroes,” Kozlov said of the soldiers who saved him, in an interview at a hotel in Ramat Gan, central Israel, where he is now living with his mother and brother.

He said the commandos were very excited, smiling brightly and shaking the hostages’ arms. “It was wow, wow,” Kozlov said, adding that he felt like he was once in the “lead role” of an “incredible movie.”

However, after the first few days of democracy, the excitement and adrenaline faded, He began wrestling with the sequence of events that eventually led him to a refugee camp in Gaza.

It started on October 7 when Kozlov, a modern immigrant from Russia, was conducting security operations at a music festival at the border. His Hebrew was still rudimentary and as Hamas fighters began to attack, he struggled to process what was happening.

All he could gather, he said, was once B’hatzlacha, Or excellent luck, a word that people at the party were shouting at every option as they ran for their lives. Kozlov also ran to seek shelter in the noticeably desolate area. He joined Ziv, another security measure, as they generally ran until a man in a T-shirt and jeans came up to them and announced, “Come, come.”

Kozlov breathed a sigh of joy and thanked the man, thinking they were about to be stored. Another man with a beard, fatigues and a Kalashnikov rifle was visible from behind a tree. He drove two Israelis in a Toyota Lexus. Kozlov remembers the idea that the boys should be members of an Israeli clandestine unit.

But when he asked the bearded man if he had any other guns, so that Kozlov could help him kill the terrorists advancing during the music festival, everyone in the car looked at him in complete disbelief. They immediately learned that they were headed to Gaza, a Palestinian territory controlled by Hamas.

Once there, he was chained and blindfolded and grouped with Almog Mir Jaan, also abducted from the festival. “It was really scary,” Kozlov said. “There were three of us with the guard, who did not speak. There was a big stick on one side. On the other side, a big knife.”

In the first few days, a guard removed Kozlov’s blindfold and gestured and said in Arabic: “I will – tomorrow – you – film – kill you.”

“I thought that would be the end of my story,” he said.

However, the next hour, the guards replaced their steel chains with rope and the same security guard arrived with an ancient message: “I – love – you.”

“What? Are you crazy?” Kozlov remembers thinking. “What are you doing? What’s going on?”

Over the course of the ensuing 8 months, the 3 men have been relocated to seven other homes, some with Palestinian families and others in secluded structures. Roaming guards would sometimes bring them food or packets of cards. He asked questions in broken English and claimed the highest number of deaths on 7 October. Israel estimates that about 1,200 people were killed in the attack. More than 250 others were dragged back to Gaza as hostages.

The guards also told their captives that Israel had abandoned them, stating that Kozlov’s mother was vacationing outside the country and Ziv’s wife was dating other men. Kozlov said that in general, they seemed unable to understand the suffering of the hostages.

An hour later when the hostages were clearly dissatisfied, the guards asked what was wrong.

Kozlov replied, “I don’t see the sun, I don’t see anything, I only see you guys.” “Maybe you’ll kill us in an hour. And you ask, why so sad? Because of this. All because of what you did.”

Early in the conflict, during a temporary ceasefire in November, some of the hostages hoped to be included in the shed. Hamas transferred 105 detainees to the Global Committee of Pink Go, which took them back to Israel. The Israeli government also released an additional 240 Palestinian prisoners.

But if the bombings resumed, Kozlov and his fellow captives knew they would not go home and went into “the deepest depression”, he said.

It was December when a security guard, who called himself Mohammed, brought them to the house in Nusirat, where they would live for the next six months. According to the Israeli military, the condominium belonged to the Aljamal people.

And according to the Hamas-run government media office in Gaza, Mohammed was actually Abdullah Aljamal, a writer for the Palestine Now news agency. He was also once a contract contributor to the Palestine Chronicle, an online website run by an American non-profit. Earlier this year, Jaan filed a lawsuit in US federal court alleging that the group paid Aljamal to hold three hostages.

The nearest Israeli military described him as a Hamas “operative”. He was killed along with his wife and father during the raid.

In the beginning, Aljamal joked with the hostages and played cards. However, as the ages passed, his nature became darker. They confined themselves to the cramped room where they were held, and their punishments were “really creative,” Kozlov said.

One hour in May, Kozlov accidentally drank a few drops of aqua to rub his hands. Aljamal became angry, he said, and ordered Kozlov to lie down on the bed unharmed. He then pressures Ziv and Jan to cover Kozlov with several thick blankets, allowing him to remain there for more than a generation in 90-degree weather.

Kozlov’s mother, Evgenia, noted that she heard testimony from other hostages describing physical, mental, and sexual torture, and that she feared her son would break out and return to her.

“I was very scared to see who came back to me,” she said. “But within a few minutes I saw that it was my Andrey. That hasn’t changed.”

Kozlov noted that his time spent in captivity taught him how to live. In the initial months he used to cry frequently.

“But with time, human beings run out of tears,” he said. “I spent all my emotions.”