Former Hamas hostage Ofir Engel wants to thank Rutte and gov't for their help in his release

"I was very scared. There were terrorists all around us. Houses were on fire." This is what the Dutch-Israeli Ofir Engel (18), who was taken hostage by Hamas in October and released after 54 days, says. He tells his story on Saturday in an interview with the Reformatorisch Dagblad.

During the major Hamas attack on October 7, Ofir, his girlfriend, his father-in-law, and a neighbor boy were taken from their home in Kibbutz Be'eri by armed Hamas fighters. The girlfriend was released almost immediately; the rest were kidnapped to the Gaza Strip. There, they were held in an apartment.

The young Dutch-Israeli told the newspaper that when he was kidnapped, he and the other hostages were put in an apartment somewhere in Gaza. "Our hands were tied behind our backs. We got all kinds of questions: Were you in the army? Who is your family? Later, they called family and friends. They came to watch us, gaped at us, and laughed at us. It felt like we were an attraction at the zoo."

That same evening, Hamas took the group of hostages to the next address, where they were held captive for 26 days. According to Engel, they were not allowed to go outside or use the restroom without first asking one of the terrorists. Furthermore, it was hard to get enough to eat to keep their strength up. "In the morning and evening, we got one pita bread with cheese. I lost 8 kilos in those weeks," he told the Reformatorisch Dagblad.

For one moment, death was very close, Ofir told the newspaper. "They came after forty days with a camera. They said that I would probably die that night. I had to give my name and age and tell Prime Minister Netanyahu to stop the war. (..) I also had to write a kind of suicide note or draft a will. To this day, that video has not been published." He was released after 54 days through a prisoner exchange between Hamas and the Israeli government. The boy next door was also released. His father-in-law, however, was later found to have been murdered.

Engel was born in Israel but has family in the Netherlands, like his grandfather, who was born in the Netherlands. Shortly after Ofir's kidnapping, he was given Dutch nationality through an emergency procedure because this might increase the chance of release.

Before the hostage-taking, the family had started a procedure to naturalize the boy as a Dutch citizen. That process pushed through quickly when the boy was taken hostage in the hope that Engel would be released more quickly if he had dual nationality.

"I am very grateful to the Dutch government for all the help it has provided (..) I would like to meet Prime Minister Mark Rutte in person again to say thank you," Ofir Engel told the Reformatorisch Dagblad.