Israeli hostage released from 2 years of captivity in Gaza struggles to rebuild his life

DIMONA, Israel (AP) — During the two years he was held captive in Gaza, Segev Kalfon had a recurring dream: slowly walking through a supermarket, browsing each aisle for his favorite foods, taking in the brightly colored packages and smells.

Since being released on Oct. 13, his dreams have flipped: Most nights when he closes his eyes, he is back on a dirty piece of foam mattress in the 2-square-meter (22-square-foot) room in a Hamas tunnel where he was kept with five other hostages, counting each tile and crack in the cement to distract himself from severe hunger and near-daily physical torture.

“I was in the lowest place a person can be before death, the lowest. I had no control over anything, when to eat, when to shower, how much I want to eat,” said Kalfon, 27. During the worst parts of captivity, he was so skinny he could count the individual vertebrae jutting from his spine.

Now that he’s back home in Dimona in southern Israel, Kalfon is trying to piece together a post-captivity life. He spends much of his time juggling appointments with an array of doctors and psychologists.

One of the strangest aspects of his release, Kalfon said, is that for two years, his entire life revolved around trying to please his captors, so they might share more food or spare a beating. Now that he’s out, “everyone is trying to please me,” he said.

From a family bakery to a Hamas tunnel

Before being taken hostage at the Nova music festival, Kalfon worked at his family’s bakery in the town of Arad and was studying finance and investments.

When rockets started flying at the start of the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, 2023, Kalfon said he and his closest friend tried to help others at the festival escape. Kalfon remembers pleading with a group of people who had taken cover in a yellow dumpster, telling them to come with him, that they were in a death trap. For two years, Kalfon wondered what happened to them. After his release, he learned they were all killed.

Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages during their cross-border assault that day. Israel’s ensuing offensive has killed more than 71,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government and maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as generally reliable by U.N. agencies and independent experts.

While in captivity, every moment “felt like an eternity,” Kalfon said. The only thing that broke up the monotony was a meager portion of food and water once a day.

There were so many times he felt close to death: during frequent bombardment by the Israeli military, going through COVID and other illnesses with no medicine, enduring starvation and frequent physical torture. He said his captors used bicycle chains as whips and pummeled the hostages while wearing large rings to leave painful welts.

“We didn’t even have energy to yell out, because no one hears you,” he said. “You’re in a tunnel 30 meters underground; no one knows what’s going on.”

The worst part was the last three months of his captivity, Kalfon said, when he was kept in isolation and felt like he was losing his sanity.

In the darkest places, faith brings a ray of light

Both Kalfon and his family, advocating in Israel for his release, further turned to their Jewish faith to get through the dark times. Kalfon’s family filled their homes with additional Jewish books, ritual objects and prayers from senior rabbis.

Kalfon and the other five hostages made a tradition of marking the start of Jewish holidays or the Sabbath by saying prayers over a bit of water and moldy pita.

The hostages used a square of precious toilet paper, where one roll had to last six people for two months, for the ritual skullcap that Jewish men traditionally wear during prayers.

A radio the captors had given to the hostages in hopes of converting them to Islam through recordings of the Quran sometimes allowed them to capture signals from Israeli news.

Once, when Kalfon was at his lowest and considering an escape attempt, which likely would have led to his death, he turned on the radio and heard his mother’s voice. He said it felt like a divine message to hold on for a little longer.

“I was living in the body of a dead person, living in a grave,” Kalfon said. “To get out of this grave, it’s nothing else if not a miracle.”

Kalfon was released along with 19 other living hostages as part of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire. He considers U.S. President Donald Trump a “messenger from God,” sure that no one else could have halted the fighting. His family has hung nearly a dozen American flags around the house in recognition of the U.S. contribution to his return.

‘War is starting with my soul’

Since his return, Kalfon is getting used to a new life, one where he is famous after his name and face were broadcast across Israel during the fight to release the hostages.

“Everyone wants to support me and say, ‘You’re such a hero,’” Kalfon said. “I don’t feel like a hero. Every person would want to survive.”

Kalfon knows he has a long journey to recovery after his years in captivity and a post-traumatic stress disorder diagnosis from before he was taken hostage.

“Although the war in Gaza is over, now my war is starting with my soul, to try to deal with thoughts that are very difficult,” he said.

He tries to keep his schedule busy to distract himself.

“But every night when I’m alone, it comes up,” Kalfon said. Even a small noise can startle him awake and thrust him into a terrifying flashback, so he barely sleeps.

For the immediate future, he wants to share his story more widely. He said he has been shocked by the rise in global antisemitism and anti-Israel fervor since he was captured and wants to make sure people hear his story, especially those who tore down posters of the hostages or accuse Israel of lying.

“I’m proof that it happened,” he said. “I felt it with my body. I saw it with my own eyes.” ___

Associated Press writer Sam Mednick contributed from Tel Aviv, Israel.