report
A Ukrainian family between Zhytomyr and Ashkelon: Olena Vlasenko fled to Israel with her two youngest children to escape Russia’s missiles. Her husband stayed – and is now worried about his family after the Hamas attack.
Oleh Vlasenko smokes one cigarette after another while staring at his cell phone. The short, blurry videos show a deserted city with clouds of smoke in the background. “My wife is filming this from her balcony in Ashkelon,” he says, stunned. After almost 20 months of aggressive war, sirens and Russian missile and drone attacks have become a bitter part of his everyday life, but every air alarm in Ashkelon makes the 49-year-old IT expert nervous.
His hands shake as he scrolls through the Telegram channels. His wife Olena lives in the small Israeli port city of Ashkelon, just 30 kilometers north of the Gaza Strip – around 3,500 kilometers from Zhytomyr.
Separated for the first time in 25 years
Until the major Russian attack, the Vlasenko family lived in Zhytomyr, around 180 kilometers west of Kiev. Then Olena Vlasenko went to Israel with the two younger of their three children. Unlike her husband, she is Jewish and the Jewish community in Zhytomyr helped with her departure. Due to the current martial law, men between the ages of 18 and 60 are only allowed to leave the country in exceptional cases – but Oleh could have come with us to Israel because he is only partially fit for the army, he says.
But he didn’t want to leave his eldest son Svyatoslav alone in Zhytomyr. After 25 years of marriage together, Olena and Oleh Wlasenko are separated for the first time. “It was difficult for me to let her go. It was the first time in her life that my wife was away for so long and our youngest wasn’t even three years old at the time,” he says.
Fleeed Ukraine with the children
Ashkelon is one of the centers of the current escalation between Hamas and Israel, says Olena Vlasenko later on the phone. “We hear how the Israeli Air Force is bombing the Gaza Strip. We also feel it because we are in a 30 kilometer zone.”
Photos show a brown-haired, cheerful-looking woman in her mid-40s. She has found a job in Israel, although not in her profession as a lawyer. From the Russian war of aggression, she has now found herself in the middle of the war in the Middle East with her four-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son. “There is shelling, damage to houses and unfortunately there are also victims in our city,” she says.
During the phone call with her there is an air alert in Ashkelon. “Hear the Iron Dome missile defense system,” she said. Her daughter cries in the background: “I’m scared.” And her mother tries to calm her down.
Olena Vlasenko in Jerusalem: You cannot compare the destruction caused by Hamas rockets with the damage caused by Russian shelling, she says, also because Israel is better protected.
Daily calls to Israel
Around 14,000 Ukrainians are registered with the Ukrainian embassy in Tel Aviv. But there are significantly more people living in Israel, suspects a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry in Kiev.
Oleksandr Haydar’s son, daughter and grandchildren also live in Israel. The retired soldier does not want to say exactly where. However, his children left Ukraine many years ago. He himself lives in Irpin near Kiev and is the managing director of the “Religious Union of Progressive Jewish Communities of Ukraine”. His relatives in Israel are doing well, but the thought of those kidnapped in the hands of Hamas is what hurts him the most at the moment, he says in his office in Kiev.
Many people in Ukraine have relatives, friends and acquaintances in Israel. Now the lines are overloaded with so many calls, people are worried and calling. “My wife and I also call several times every day to ask how our children and friends are doing. Everyone tries to reassure us.”
“Getting even closer to each other”
For Oleksandr Haydar, apart from Hamas, Russia and Iran are the most destructive actors in the Middle East. He definitely sees the danger of a third world war. He is certain that his Western partners will continue to support Ukraine. His family has come together as a result of the situation. “We understood how valuable we are to each other, how much we have to value the time we spend together and we have become even closer. Whether in Canada, Israel or here in Ukraine, we are a family.”
Ukrainian embassy in Tel Aviv evacuated hundreds
According to the embassy in Tel Aviv, at least twelve Ukrainians have been killed since the Hamas attack on Israel and at least seven are missing. The embassy is helping those wishing to leave the country; hundreds have already been flown to Romania. There have been no civilian flights to Ukraine since the beginning of the major Russian invasion. Buses and planes in Egypt are available for Ukrainians in the sealed-off Gaza Strip.
“Iron Dome only lets ten percent of missiles through”
But Olena Vlasenko doesn’t want to leave her new home in Ashkelon at all. The children suffer from the disturbing experiences in Ukraine and she trusts in the Israeli missile defense and the shelter in her house. If there are air raids and Hamas rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip, they could actually sleep peacefully there, says the 45-year-old. She feels well protected in Ashkelon.
“The Iron Dome only lets through 10 percent of the rockets fired, and the destruction caused by these rockets cannot be compared at all to those in Ukraine, which cause much more damage,” she says.
Olena’s shelter. She says she feels safe here.
Her husband in Zhytoymyr wants his wife to come back with the younger children – at least for a while. He also says that the security system in Israel is at the highest level. “But war is war and they went from one war to another. If we had known then what was going to happen in Israel, we might have made different decisions, but now it’s pointless to think about the past.”
Alienation from children
The couple assess the current situation in Israel differently – Olena is concerned about developments in Ukraine. Russia wants an escalation in Israel to distract the world from Ukraine. “I expect that there will also be some kind of escalation in Ukraine,” she says.
Your husband clearly finds it difficult to accept his wife’s attitude. He believes his Olena is not correctly assessing the danger. The estrangement from her two children in Israel also bothers Oleh, especially with her younger daughter, who already speaks Hebrew very well. The IT expert used to think that you can be connected anytime and anywhere via the Internet. Now he has to admit that telephone or video communication cannot replace direct communication and hugs with his wife and children. “She makes her own decisions and that changes her. It has become more difficult for us to communicate with each other,” he says.