From our special correspondent in Jerusalem – Ilia fled his native Russia because he wanted no part in its invasion of Ukraine. Now an Israeli citizen, he tells FRANCE 24 about his experience of fleeing one war and landing in another.
Ilia, 25, left his home and family behind to avoid the war in Ukraine. But war has caught up with him in his adoptive home of Israel.
Like many Russians, the young Muscovite chose to leave his country in May 2022, shortly after the invasion of Ukraine, fearing he would be called up to serve.
“I chose to live,” he says simply, seated on a park bench in his new home of Jerusalem.
Ilia, from a family of Ashkenazi Jews, says he refused to close his eyes to the injustice of Russia’s war. He couldn’t bear the thought of one day being drafted to fight in Ukraine.
“I couldn’t stay behind. I felt uncomfortable with the letter ‘Z’, the symbol of war that I saw plastered everywhere, including on buses,” he explains, referring to the pro-war propaganda motif used by the Russian government and its supporters.
“Russia always takes the wrong path,” he says. “Every 10 or 20 years it embarks on wars of aggression that it seeks to pass off as just. It’s exhausting.”
Ilia says he became politically conscious as a teenager. In 2019 he volunteered to work at a foundation set up by Alexei Navalny, a leading opponent to President Vladimir Putin who is now serving multiple jail terms in Russia.
Navalny was arrested in 2021 upon returning from Germany, where he had been treated for a suspected poison attack. In the following days, Ilia was himself arrested and detained overnight for attending a rally in support of the Kremlin critic.
It was a “deeply unpleasant experience”, he recalls. “It’s stressful because you never know whether they will come back to arrest to you, even if you’re an ordinary activist.”
To avoid further brushes with law enforcement, Ilia chose to exit the country via Georgia, where flexible visa procedures have lured many Russians fleeing the war.
“I stayed there a year and then I came here to become an ‘ole hadash’ (new immigrant in Hebrew),” he says. “I obtained Israeli citizenship in July 2023.”
Since moving to Jerusalem, Ilia has started learning Hebrew and enrolled at a local university, eager to study the humanities. Perhaps one day he will become a professor, he says.
He has started building a new life, far from Moscow and his loved ones, whom he can still see from time to time in Georgia.
“Almost all of my old friends have now left Russia. Many are in Georgia, Turkey, Germany or here in Israel,” he says. “I feel happy here, I was having fun.”
A ‘righteous’ struggle
The ease of his new life suddenly ended on October 7, when Ilia awoke to the horror of the carnage perpetrated by Hamas militants in southern Israel.
“I was shocked and scared,” he recalls. “It felt like being in a horrible movie.”
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War had caught up with Ilia. Only this time, he says, it's a very different type of war.
“In Ukraine it’s black and white, Russia is the only aggressor,” he says. “In Israel I am at home and I feel like we are defending ourselves. It is a lot more righteous.”
Ilia now had to reassure his worried relatives back home in Russia.
“They were scared and alarmed, we spent a lot of time on the phone. But we have faith in the Iron Dome,” he says, referring to the missile defence system designed to intercept rockets fired into Israel.
Ilia soon got used to the air raid sirens that send Israelis rushing to bomb shelters several times a day. He recalls standing face to face with an elderly neighbour wearing only his underwear.
The young student has had little sleep since the start of the conflict and the strain is showing. With classes suspended, he spends most of his time watching the news and on social media.
“I want to know what is really happening, so I watch everything, including the videos of massacres. I cannot help it,” he sighs.
Ilia says he feels more saddened than afraid. “It’s depressing to see that so many lives have been lost, that people suffer and that I’m right nearby,” he adds.
While the former peace activist says he is prepared to learn how to handle weapons, he will have to wait. As a newcomer to Israel, the native of Russia is not a reservist, and therefore cannot join the army to defend his new country.
Instead, Ilia has signed up for all the voluntary work he can find in order to help the war effort. “I’m ready to do what I can,” he says.
Even if Russia pulls out of Ukraine, there will be no going back, he adds. “My future is here.”
This is a translation of the original in French.
