Rachel and David are a couple in their 60s who were kept captive in their own house in Ofakim, some 25 kilometers from Gaza, for 20 hours by Hamas terrorists following the horrific assault in which at least 900 people were killed and 2,600 more were injured in Israel, according to Israeli officials.
We just went into their residence, which is covered with blood from the operation to release them. Their son Evi, a police officer, was instrumental in their rescue.
Evi recalled a confrontation in which he stood in the doorway with his pistol directed at one of the militants’ head, while the man held his arm over his mother’s neck and a grenade in his other hand, She told her son, with five fingers stretched over her face, that there were five hostage takers in her home.
A SWAT squad eventually persuaded Evi to leave, and they took up the rescue. Rachel and David said they used their wits to survive their 20-hour experience. Rachel said she fed her captives coffee and cookies while hell raged around them.
“I cooked them chicken!” I gave them coffee. “I knew if they were hungry, they’d be angry,” Rachel adds as her husband David watches.
David claims that as the SWAT squad burst in, he leaped over his wife to protect her. She claims that his act of heroics also preserved their 40-year marriage.
