Emily Cohen got her first glimpse of the hostage she fought to bring home through an ambulance window outside Tel Aviv’s Tel Hashomer hospital last Sunday.
It was part of the globally anticipated convoy delivering Emily Damari, 28, Doron Steinbrecher, 31 and Romi Gonen, 24 to freedom after 15 months in captivity, three of 33 anticipated to be released during the first stage of the hostage-ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas.
Fifty-four year old Londoner Cohen put her life on hold for 471 days to “dedicate every ounce of my being to do media relations for Israel” and to secure the release from Gaza of a Spurs-obsessed, British-Israeli she’s never met.
An experienced media relations expert, she has been supporting Kibbutz Kfar Aza (from where Emily Damari was kidnapped) since the war started.
On 29 October 2023, she was put in contact with Emily’s mother, Mandy. And they’ve worked together ever since, campaigning to bring her home.
October 6th, 2024. Mandy Damari speaking at Hyde Park for the vigil marking the first anniversary of 7th October. Pic: Mark Thomas
Cohen says that Mandy Damari is “the strongest person I have met. At face value she is quiet and unassuming. But she is so together, so bright and so stoically strong.”
She adds: “Emily has a tattoo on her left arm which says ‘My mum is always right’ and she really is. She is a total inspiration for me and I have learnt so much about strength and courage from her. She has made jokes to me over the past 15 months; her humour is part of her defiance and clearly where Emily gets it from.”
Initially reticent to put herself in the forefront of the campaign to bring her daughter home, Mandy was eventually persuaded by Cohen to fly to London for the 7 October anniversary event at Hyde Park last year where she spoke in public for the first time.
Pic: Emily Cohen
“That,” says Cohen, “was her debut to the world and that was how we introduced Emily.”
With Cohen’s support, she met UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who she expressed disappointment with in December, after he failed to call publicly for aid to the Israeli captives hours after she appealed directly to him.
Before the ceasefire had been agreed, she recalls walking her dog in Regents Park, speaking to Mandy on the phone in Israel and saying to her: “Look, Trump is getting in in in a week. The inauguration is a week today. We need to give it one final push, whatever we can do.”
One year anniversary rally for 7th October, Hyde Park. Pic: Mark Thomas
And then Cohen “just had this feeling”. She dropped her dog at home and drove to the airport, securing the last seat on the plane. Everything after that is a blur.
Cohen arranged for Mandy to film a direct appeal sitting on the steps outside Emily Damari’s home on Kibbutz Kfar Aza. She describes Mandy as being “incredible. She talked a lot about Emily. It’s the first time I’d actually been inside Emily’s house. Being there with her and seeing the gun shots in the house was very, very, very profound.”
The ceasefire was signed the next day, but Mandy “just never, not at one point during this whole process, got remotely sort of excited, because she has had her excitement completely smashed to pieces on too many occasions. So even with this ceasefire, no one really knew. We didn’t know who was coming out, and we didn’t know if they were alive or dead. All we could do was pray and try and keep our spirits up.”
Emily Cohen on hearing Emily Damari has been released. Pic: Courtesy
The countdown for the names to be released was “utterly depressing,” recalls Cohen.
“On the Saturday, we were all told that at 4pm Israel time, a list would be released. The whole of Israel was glued to the TV. I was with Mandy, and 4pm came and went. Then 5pm, 6pm and 7pm. The deal literally was disintegrating before all of our faces.”
She adds: “In hindsight, we’re all morons; idiots to think that we actually would have got that list when they (Hamas) said we were going to get it, because this is all part of the psychological trauma. So after all of that, Mandy and I went to the hostage rally in the Negev. I don’t know how she did that. It must have been absolute torture. I think at that point in time, she just thought, ‘that’s it. Game over’.
Mandy Damari with her daughter Emily
Sunday, the planned release day, started with Mandy “just not believing very much at all. And then 0945 in the morning Israel time, Hamas put out on their telegram channels the names of Emily, Doron and Romi.”
Cohen’s phone was immediately bombarded by members of the British press, saying “Is it true? Is it true? Oh, my God! Congratulations! “Wow, wow, wow!”
But it took an agonising hour before verification came through. But still, Israel didn’t know whether they were alive or dead.
Cohen pauses, remembering. “You can’t imagine the stress, the adrenaline and the hopeful excitement. But not being able to get excited because you don’t actually know what you’re going to be picking up, and IF they are alive, what condition are they in?”
In a daze, Cohen wandered down to Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square, which rapidly started to fill up with the international press.
Spurs and Arsenal fans supporting Emily Damari.
“Everyone’s hugging strangers; everyone’s talking to everyone, and they’ve got this massive screen up in the square. And everyone’s watching the screen, and then you see the Red Cross vans bombing it into Gaza, and everyone’s just like, Oh my God!”
Then Cohen saw a freeze frame picture of all three girls together.
“And there Emily is in the middle. There she is. I’m looking at this girl who I have been campaigning for, on behalf of Mandy, morning, noon and night, seven days a week since the seventh of October. There she is alive. Then they got into the Israeli vehicles and the square erupted.”
Dazed, Emily Cohen travelled to the hospital. She found herself “standing with all Emily Damari’s best friends, and they’re chanting, ‘Emily! Emily!’ The helicopters are coming down from the sky right in front of us, the wind is blowing your hair from the rotors and these kids are all surrounding the door of one of the ambulances. Then a window slides open from the one behind, and Emily sticks her head out and gives an enormous wolf whistle. It was as if to say, ‘Hey you idiots! I’m in this one, not in that one!’ And then they all went nuts. I could not breathe at that point. I was just beside myself.”
Cohen pauses, reliving the extraordinary experience.
Emily Damari’s friends waiting for her outside Tel Hashomer hospital. Pic: Emily Cohen
Eventually, around midnight, she got home.
“I don’t even remember what time I spoke to Mandy later that evening. It was so overwhelming. I’m not even family, but it was amazing to hear her happy. She got her girl back.”
She describes Emily Damari as a “defiant lioness”, adding that “every single thing Mandy has told me about her is true. There were 45 people in the hospital saying ‘she’s my best friend’. She is totally there for everyone. She is very funny. All the Damaris are. Emily is feisty, powerful and fun. She’s iconic.”
Whilst she’s never met Emily Damari, Cohen says the 28-year old left her “the most incredible message on my phone. And she sent me a text and a photo of her and her mum, which I will treasure.”
Mandy Damari, Hostage vigil, Negev desert, before Emily Damari’s release. Pic: Emily Cohen
Whilst Emily Cohen made sure that the public, media and government couldn’t forget the name ‘Emily Damari’, she insists that activist group ‘Stop the Hate’ get a “huge, huge shout out”, describing them as “the guerilla army of amazing volunteers who have done all the yellow ribbons, poster drops of Emily, all the balloons at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium.”
She adds: “They’ve done all the work. They’re the ones who have gone onto the streets, who did a poster drop of 10k posters that went viral across Leeds, Brighton and London.’”
Cohen goes on to praise Gail Davidson as “the PR guru who also needs to be given enormous recognition for her tireless efforts. She has generously given me hours of her time to help campaign and push Emily’s name to the British media. Without her help I would not have been able to reach the audiences that we have. She really is the publicist extraordinaire.”
Mandy Damari outside her daughter Emily’s house, Kibbutz Kfar Aza
Cohen adds: “From next week I will be heavily campaigning again for the other hostage families I’m connected to to help them continue the fight.”
These include supporting Aviva Siegel, (kidnapped and released after 52 days) campaigning for the release of her US citizen husband Keith; supporting Liran Berman to bring back his twin brothers Gali and Ziv, who were kidnapped with Emily Damari. She is also been working with lawyers, Adam Rose and Adam Wagner, who represent other hostages with close UK connections: Eli Sharabi (whose British wife and daughters were murdered on 7th October) and his brother Yossi, killed in January 2024 and whose body remains in Gaza; Oded Lifshitz, whose daughter is British; and Avinatan Or, whose mother is British and whose girlfriend is Noa Argamani.
Pic: Emily Cohen
Whilst she’s now taking a few days off to “re-charge and process”, she has already booked her next flight to Israel.
Reflecting on the past 15 months, Cohen says “to say that I feel so unbelievably grateful isn’t even a strong enough word. The fact that I have been part of this journey that has had this unbelievable happy ending is something I will treasure for the rest of my life. That I was able to be part of it in some way is amazing. When I got home last night, my husband had gone out and bought every single English newspaper. Mandy and Emily are on the cover of every single one. You don’t even get that with Trump’s inauguration. I love the Damari family.”
Silent vigil for British hostage Emily Damari, held in Leeds. November 2024
She says it was “joyous” to finally take 55 of her Emily Damari posters and throw them in the bin.
Ending the conversation to make a coffee, Cohen says she’s now switching her phone off for two or three days. “But,” she adds, “then I’ll be full throttle again.”
