Campaigners staged a protest in Tel Aviv to mark 1,000 days since Avera crossed into Gaza (Yuval Abraham/MEE)
One thousand days ago Avera Mengistu, a 30-year-old Israeli citizen of Ethiopian descent, entered the Gaza strip on his own and was promptly taken into captivity by the Palestinian movement Hamas, which controls the coastal enclave.
Reportedly suffering from mental illness, Mengistu climbed over the fence separating Israel and Gaza in September 2014. He is one of three Israeli citizens
said to be held by Hamas.
Marking 1,000 days since his imprisonment, activists on Saturday demonstrated in Tel Aviv in the hope of drawing public attention to Mengistu, who they say has been abandoned by the Israeli government, media and public.
Yonit Tlayenesh Fenta is the head coordinator of the Committee for the Release of Avera Mengistu, a modest group of Ethiopian activists working to introduce the public to Mengistu’s case.
Fenta is a longtime friend of his family, who live in Ashkelon in southern Israel, and said it has been an uphill struggle to get the public interested in Mengistu's case.
"Avera falls into several groups that are oppressed and 'invisible' to Israeli society," she said.
'The invisible people'
"He's mentally unstable, the kind of person we ignore when we see on the street; he comes from a troubled neighborhood; he doesn't have a rich family with status and connections, and we can't ignore the big elephant in the room – he's black."
Mengistu wasn't the first Israeli to be taken hostage by Hamas. Gilad Shalit, a white Israeli soldier was captured by Hamas in 2006 and was held for five years until his release in a prisoner exchange agreement. Comparing the two cases reveals an uncomfortable truth.
We have to face the fact that Avera won't become 'the child of us all' like Gilad
- Yonit Tlayenesh Fenta, campaigner
In the first case, an extensive, widely covered public relations campaign titled "Gilad is Still Alive" was waged, sweeping the entire Israeli public behind it.
Jewish Israeli families tended to leave one chair empty for Gilad during the traditional Passover meal, prominent artists and celebrities held fund-raising performances, and he was widely referred to as "the child of us all".
In stark contrast, Mengistu's name is rarely mentioned on Israeli media and most Israelis are unaware of his existence. Lacking public support, the campaign for his release can barely afford to make signs or T-shirts for its activities.
Avera's brother Ilan said his families' lives have filled up with darkness since he disappeared, "and that darkness only increases because they feel the government ignores them.” (Yuval Abraham/MEE)
"We have to face the fact that Avera won't become 'the child of us all' like Gilad," Fenta told MEE, "but still, the family is sad to see that they are being ignored to such an extent."
Other reasons for this neglect could be that the Israeli public tends to identify more with soldiers, and that they don't want to release more convicted terrorists in another prisoner exchange with Hamas, she said.
"The Shalit family could afford to finance a struggle, fly all over the world, halt their lives. Even if they had no money the public was very active and raised the funds for them," Fenta said.
"In this case the family can't afford to stop working. They are too busy surviving the hardships of day-to-day life. The mother works as a cleaner. She told me her work distracts her from thinking about Avera, but I see how exhausted she is because of it.
"Every meeting we go to breaks her physically and mentally. She's an elderly woman. I don't know what to tell her. It's hard, very hard.
"She reached a place where she's saying: 'I just wish they'd tell me if he's dead or alive, if I should mourn him or not."
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MEE talked to Avera's brother, Ilan Mengistu, about the way the family has been dealing with the tragedy. He said the hardest thing for him is to see his parents' helplessness.
"They worry about Avera on a daily basis but barely understand what's going on and can't help him."
"It's like their lives filled up with darkness ever since he left, and that darkness only increases because they feel the government ignores them," he said.
According to Israeli media, in February Hamas rejected an offer to exchange Mengistu for a mentally disabled Palestinian jailed in Israel.
According to Fenta, the state doesn't keep the family in the loop. "We'd expect a meeting with the prime minister, with people who make decisions, but it doesn't happen, we aren't getting answers."
The family doesn't even know if Mengistu is dead or alive.
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"An unofficial source told us that Avera is alive and is held by Hamas, but this was over a year ago," Fenta said.
The Israeli army refused to comment on MEE's request for information on Mengistu's current physical condition.
