Released hostage Karina Ariev’s sister says ex-soldier focused on Oct. 7 failure
Sasha Ariev talks about Karina’s desire to commemorate her friends killed at Nahal Oz, as Shlomi Berger, father of released hostage Agam talks about the desire for normalcy
Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center
As released hostage Karina Ariev arrived home this week to the Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Ze’ev, she was focused on her recovery, which has included trying to understand what happened on the Nahal Oz army base on October 7, 2023, the day she was taken captive.
“It’s harder to talk about that day than it is to speak about the 15 months of her captivity,” said Sasha Ariev, Karina’s older sister who has served as her family’s spokesperson for the duration of Karina’s captivity.
Ariev, one of the five surveillance soldiers who was released home after 15 months of captivity, was taken hostage early in the morning of October 7, along with Agam Berger, Daniella Gilboa, Liri Albag and Naama Levy. Many more of her comrades were killed.
According to recent reports, the five IDF surveillance soldiers were held hostage in Gaza City by a senior member of Hamas’s military wing.
Sasha Ariev did not say if her sister was held hostage with the others for the entire time but confirmed that Karina and Daniella Gilboa were held together throughout their captivity.
Karina had last spoken to her parents at 7:00 a.m. that morning. They later found a Hamas video publicized on Telegram, in which Karina was one of three young women lying down in a jeep, surrounded by men speaking in Arabic. Karina was one of the three, her face wounded and bleeding.
She had been in the army for one year by October 7, 2023, and she was stationed at the Nahal Oz army base on the Gaza border for nine months.
“She was one of the more experienced surveillance soldiers, and Daniella too,” said Sasha Ariev. “They were the ones who were supposed to train the new girls.”
The new recruits included Levy, Albag and Berger, who had arrived at the Nahal Oz base a few days earlier.
They were all part of the team working as one of the communication lookouts at the army base near Kibbutz Nahal Oz — part of the team of soldiers who watch the feeds from the cameras placed on the barrier that was breached by Hamas terrorists.
On that morning, as the base was invaded by Hamas terrorists, staff officers and surveillance soldiers entrenched themselves in the war room.
Fifteen surveillance soldiers were killed, out of a total of 52 people killed at the base on the day.
An investigation into the nature of the deaths of IDF surveillance soldiers serving on the Nahal Oz base on October 7 has reportedly revealed that they were killed by a toxic gas that caused suffocation and loss of consciousness within a few minutes of exposure.
Seven surveillance soldiers were abducted from the Nahal Oz base, including Or Megidish, who was then rescued by the IDF in October 2023; Noa Marciano, who was killed in captivity; and Ariev, Gilboa, Albag and Levy, who were freed five days before Berger.
While surveillance soldiers provide real-time intelligence information to soldiers in the field, earning them the name “the eyes of the army,” members of the all-female force believe that they were not taken seriously, partly due to their gender.
According to the accounts of the soldiers, no action was taken by the more senior officers who received the reports, and the information was disregarded as unimportant by intelligence officials.
“Even before the 7th, the job was complicated, it was hard,” said Sasha, Karina’s sister. “There was the distance from home, the complicated work of watching the screens, and knowing that the higher-ups didn’t listen to her.”
What made Karina’s service palatable before October 7 were the friends and the atmosphere that the soldiers created for themselves.
Karina keeps talking about what happened that day, how it could have happened that the base was invaded by a swarm of terrorists, said Sasha Ariev.
“She really thinks about it, she wants to know how this happened, how it could have been allowed to happen,” said her sister. “They spoke about it all the time during their captivity, how no one listened to them.”
“It’s just a different experience, to know what it is to be a surveillance soldier, to have served many shifts,” she added.
Now that Karina has been released and returned home, she’s focused on the struggle to get the rest of the hostages released. She’s familiar with the names of the soldiers who were taken hostage from the tanks at Nahal Oz, “and it’s one of the things that pains her,” said Sasha Ariev. “They were taken hostage on the same day, and they’re still there.”
She is also focused on commemorating her friends who were killed in Nahal Oz on that day.
“She knew that they had been killed when she was being taken into captivity; she saw what happened,” said Sasha Ariev, “and that occupied her mind a lot. She wants to meet with their parents and talk to them and tell them that she survived for them, not just for herself. She goes back to their commemoration again and again. She talks about them all the time.”
What’s helpful is that Karina is ready to talk to them, said her sister, 25, a neurobiology student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem who paused her studies and work for the last months to lead her family’s efforts in urging the government to move forward on a hostage deal.
“She said that she waited for this moment to share what happened to her,” Sasha Ariev. “It’s important that we just listen to what she tells us.”
Karina also fulfilled her army service, which was completed during her 15 months of captivity.
“She finished her service,” said her sister. “Now she needs to learn how to make her own choices, something she didn’t do in school or in the army or in captivity.”
The challenge is to return to normal life.
“We’re feeling the hug of a nation,” she added. “People send us presents and food and come to give us hugs and Karina has to get used to it. She keeps asking, ‘What? Why? Why are they giving me presents?'”
The return to ordinary life
The adjustment to regular life is a process, said Shlomi Berger, father of released hostage Agam Berger, who was released five days after the other four surveillance soldiers.
In the two weeks since his daughter returned home to Israel, Shlomi Berger said it’s a miracle that his daughter returned in relatively good physical health, compared with the skeletal condition of the three male hostages released last Saturday.
“It’s a miracle, but she really came back okay, especially when you see the men who were released last Shabbat [Saturday], they looked like concentration camp survivors,” he said. “She has some rehabilitation ahead of her, she didn’t walk a lot and she has to strengthen her body, so that’s the next challenge.”
The other challenge, he said, is for Agam to return to regular life.
“These girls have to figure out how to go to the mall and the corner store, and will people come up to them and want to hug and kiss them,” he said. “They want to be anonymous.”
It’s a shift that’s made slowly, described Shlomi Berger, starting with walks outside their Holon home at night, when there are fewer people around.
“We’ll get to the moment when she’ll go where she wants,” he said. “We all need to get back to regular life.”
As Agam slowly shares the details of the last 15 months, Shlomi Berger said he felt a sense of surprise at hearing about his daughter’s steadfastness, as she told her parents about fasting on Yom Kippur and Tisha B’Av, even obtaining a different kind of flour on Passover to observe the leavened bread-free holiday.
“I couldn’t believe it,” said Berger, adding that the five surveillance soldiers kept journals and a calendar that they weren’t allowed to bring with them back to Israel. “They tried to keep their identities and follow the holidays and Shabbat.”
Agam’s family had heard from other former hostages released in November 2023 about Agam’s turn to religious observance as a way of strengthening her own resolve in captivity and had followed their daughter’s example.
“We chose belief,” he said. “That’s what kept us sane.”
For now, said Shlomi Berger, they’re focused on her rehabilitation and doing it together.
“Now we’ll be with Agam, hand in hand until we can let her go,” he said.
It’s not possible to simply return to regular life, said Sasha Ariev.
“Karina is back, and our family is complete, but there are hostages who aren’t back, so I’m not going back to my life just because my sister is back,” said Sasha Ariev. “It took so long for this ceasefire to happen, and I’ll continue to struggle and fight so that we get to all the stages of the ceasefire.”
