‘I heard on the radio my father was murdered’: Agam Goldstein-Almog recounts captivity in Gaza

The 17-year-old abducted by Hamas says ‘I just told my mother they are going to torture me, they are going to rape me, but I didn’t really understand it’

Returned hostage Agam Goldstein-Almog on Thursday recounted the tragic events of October 7 onwards, including her treatment in captivity and the terror that has kept her from crying since returning in late November, in an interview with the Israeli Army Radio.

“I remember our entry into the city. I just told my mother – they are going to torture me, they are going to rape me. But I didn’t really understand it, and it seems to me that they didn’t understand either, there was just an ‘out’ feeling,” the 17-year-old Agam confided.

“We were cut off from what was happening,” Agam described the conditions, though she could hear a radio that made her believe “We were sure that they had given up on us.”

On October 7, Agam was kidnapped from Kibbutz Kfar Aza during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. Her mother Chen and 11-year-old brother Gal and 9-year-old brother Tal were also abducted. Their father Nadav and eldest 20-year-old sister Yam were brutally murdered.

“There was hope that we would return and father would be waiting in a wheelchair. We already knew about Yam and knew there was no chance for her, but about my father there was little hope,” she said that they then heard the news about both their deaths on the radio.

Israeli soldiers remove bodies in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, near the border with Gaza, in southern Israel.Chaim Goldberg/Flash90

Agam said that her siblings and mother were not separated in captivity, and only sometimes met other abductees, since most of the time they were alone. And even though they were together, they dared not speak or make any sound.

“There are feelings that the body feels that cannot be explained. It’s a complete shock, no matter what I say, we won’t understand,” the teenager described the non-verbal communication with her mom.

“We both look at each other and understand that there will probably never be words, there will always be only feelings. Words are too small compared to what the body feels. So that’s how it was, we would look and understand, as cliché as it is.”

“Until now, I don’t understand that I was there,” she added. “It feels to me like someone else’s story, that there wasn’t really a moment of understanding of this situation. I don’t know if we will ever understand. But I remember telling my mother that something was going to be done to me, and that was the moment I realized that they really took me from home.”

“With all the difficulty involved, I was most afraid of the air force’s bombings, every night. In the beginning there was the fear of them [the terrorists], which was the greatest fear. The war and the bombings took time to arrive,” Agam confided when asked about her fears.

“I was worried about what they would do to them if my mother and I were hit by the air force bombings,” she said about her two younger brothers, Gal and Tal.

She was not able to cry in captivity, and that fear remains with her back home, saying “I wanted to mourn, and I went back, and I still haven’t gotten to that either. I can’t do it.”

A Red Cross convoy carrying Israeli and foreign hostages heads to Egypt from the Gaza Strip at the Rafah border crossing on Sunday, Nov. 26, 2023.AP Photo/Fatima Shbair

“It changed many things for the worse, and also took away my sense of security and put a lot of fear, worry, confusion and helplessness in me,” the 17-year-old answered if captivity changed her.

Asked about the moments she wanted to erase from memory, “the transitions between people there, from place to place, during each transfer I wondered if they were going to murder us. I think I would like to erase it that I would never have this question in my life, if they were going to murder me.”

“It’s losing confidence at the highest level and being indifferent to it, with a sort of everyday question like ‘Are you going to kill me?’ – and not to expect an answer of “No, not at all,” which felt as if they were saying ‘If they tell us we’ll do it, but right now no.’ It was what I felt because of how carelessly they answered. Now my value of life has changed. Theirs was always different from ours – but mine changed after something like that.”

Yocheved Lifshitz, a former Hamas hostage, seen at a support rally calling for the release of Israelis kidnapped by Hamas, which includes her 83-year-old husband Oded; at “Hostage Square” in Tel Aviv.Avshalom Sassoni / Flash90

“I can’t believe there are more people there,” she concluded. “It’s lost on me to understand how people here walk the same and drink the same cup of coffee and live the same life, after something happened that changes the order of the world. 

“I’m glad that there are people who continue with their lives, it shows a certain strength, but on the other hand – 71 days in captivity are like one long day. It’s really the same day. So we’re constantly moving forward but thinking about those who are still stuck there, and we want to say that they’re in danger.”