Pod Insights Real Survival Stories Kidnapped at Gunpoint: 81 Days in Captivity About this episode In 2013 a celebrated journalist travels to war-torn Syria. But near the front line he’s taken hostage by a group of rebel fighters. Over the next 81 days Jonathan Alpeyrie will get to know his captors extremely well. Harrowing, absurd, surreal… the ordeal will push his body and his mind to the limit. And with the threat of execution always hanging over him, forming a bond with his kidnappers will be crucial to his survival…
A Noiser podcast production. Hosted by John Hopkins.
Written by Duncan Barrett | Produced by Ed Baranski | Assistant Producer: Luke Lonergan | Exec produced by Joel Duddell | Sound supervisor: Tom Pink | Sound design by Jacob Booth, Matt Peaty | Assembly edit by Rob Plummer | Compositions by Oliver Baines, Dorry Macaulay, Tom Pink | Mix & mastering: Ralph Tittley.
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Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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1:03 John Hopkins? It's April 29, 2013.
1:06 John Hopkins? A tiny village, somewhere in war-torn Syria.
1:12 John Hopkins? A white pickup truck pulls away from an abandoned villa, trundling onto a dusty, cratered road.
1:19 John Hopkins? Inside the vehicle is photojournalist Jonathan Alperi, 34 years old, tall and athletic.
1:29 John Hopkins? Born in Paris and raised between France and the United States, he combines the cool charm of a cosmopolitan Frenchman with the rugged, all-American physique of a former swimming champ.
1:43 John Hopkins? Right now, Jonathan is traveling with a distinctly motley band of associates.
1:50 John Hopkins? At the wheel is his local fixer, Alfarukh, a smart, lanky man in his twenties. For the past week or so, he's been Jonathan's indispensable right-hand man in Syria. Translator, guide, chauffeur, and more.
2:05 John Hopkins? Next to Al Farouq, riding shotgun in the front passenger seat, is Abu Faras, a commander in the Free Syrian Army. One of a number of rebel outfits currently warring against the country's dictatorial government. Bearded, heavyset, dressed in army camo with a traditional Syrian kaffir on his head, Abu Faras is not a man you'd want to mess with. One of his soldiers stands in the bed of the truck, gripping the roof of the vehicle as it jolts up and down on the potholed desert roads.
2:37 John Hopkins? He is keeping a careful watch as they head west toward a looming mountain range.
2:43 John Hopkins? On the backseat, next to Jonathan, is a man he knows only as "No Problem", another fixer, who, as his nickname suggests, is confident he can arrange anything his clients might wish for. It's "No Problem" who has promised to get him up to the front lines. But what Jonathan doesn't know yet is that at least one of the men in the truck has probably already betrayed him.
3:09 Speaker 04 Looking back, I should have known. It's amazing how people can smile at you and look at you straight and they all know you're gonna get kidnapped. You know, you trust them. Sometimes you just have to trust people.
3:22 John Hopkins? After about fifteen minutes on the road, the truck pulls up at what looks like a rebel checkpoint.
3:29 John Hopkins? From this walled, concrete structure, three men in ski masks appear, each of them brandishing a machine gun. Slowly, they approach the vehicle, their feet kicking up dust on the sandy road.
3:43 John Hopkins? Abu Faras winds down his window.
3:47 John Hopkins? Without warning, the passenger side door is yanked open by one of the armed men.
3:52 John Hopkins? Abu Faras is hauled out of the vehicle, onto the ground. Jonathan barely has time to react before the same thing is happening to him.
4:01 John Hopkins? In a matter of seconds, every man from the truck is on his knees, guns pointed at their heads. Another masked individual emerges from the concrete structure. Jonathan's hands are tied behind his back. His t-shirt is pulled up over his head, covering his eyes. Everything goes black.
4:26 Speaker 04 It's so quick, you don't have time to react, to wonder what is happening. At the time, I remember not thinking I was being kidnapped, I just thought it was a big misunderstanding. And sometimes when it's that real and that intense, you don't realize what is going on, really.
4:44 John Hopkins? Jonathan feels something cool and hard pressed against the side of his head. The barrel of an AK-47.
4:52 John Hopkins? Then comes the most deafening sound he has ever heard.
5:00 John Hopkins? With his ears ringing, it takes a few moments for the realization to hit him. He's still alive. The shot was intended to scare him, not kill him.
5:11 Speaker 04 They break you, right from the get-go. All of this is very thought of, it's calculated. It's meant to really bring you down, break you, and to remind you that what your position is, is very much at the bottom.
5:27 John Hopkins? Jonathan feels a hand gripping his arm, he's pulled to his feet.
5:32 John Hopkins? Through his dark cotton t-shirt, he can make out the indistinct forms of the two fixers still kneeling on the ground, shaking with fear.
5:42 John Hopkins? It's either genuine, or, if they're in on this, an extremely convincing performance.
5:48 John Hopkins? An SUV emerges from behind a concrete shelter, and the three of them are manhandled into the back. Then the car speeds off, wheels kicking up the arid earth as they go. Jonathan feels the vehicle accelerate as they zoom along the rough desert roads, leaving his freedom behind them, in the dirt.
6:08 Speaker 04 And we drove away very fast, and my captivity started like that.
6:19 John Hopkins? Ever wondered what you would do when disaster strikes? If your life depended on your next decision, could you make the right choice?
6:28 John Hopkins? Welcome to Real Survival Stories. These are the astonishing tales of ordinary people thrown into extraordinary situations. People suddenly forced to fight for their lives.
6:45 John Hopkins? In this episode, we meet Jonathan Alpery. A celebrated photojournalist, in 2013, Jonathan is on his third trip to Syria when he is kidnapped by a group of rebel fighters.
6:57 John Hopkins? Over the next 81 days, he'll get to know his captors extremely well, though he'll never fully understand what they have in store for him.
7:07 John Hopkins? It will be a harrowing ordeal, testing both his body and his mind. In a country where journalists face execution by extremist groups, forming a rapport with his kidnappers will be crucial to his survival.
7:20 Speaker 04 They were doing mock executions on me. That was probably the most difficult moments for me. Like, you're trembling, right? Like, your whole body is... It kind of collapses on itself.
7:30 John Hopkins? I'm John Hopkins. From the Noiser Podcast Network, this is Real Survival Stories.
8:02 John Hopkins? It's 10 minutes later. The kidnapper's car pulls up outside a small house. Jonathan and the others are dragged inside.
8:12 John Hopkins? The driver roughs him up and shouts in his face. But not able to speak Arabic, Jonathan has no idea what he's saying. Inside, one of his captors pulls his t-shirt back down, swapping his makeshift blindfold for a kaffir tied tightly around his head.
8:30 John Hopkins? During the changeover, Jonathan gets a glimpse of his surroundings, the room that will become his home for the foreseeable future. He spots a bunk bed decorated with stickers, Mickey Mouse, the Care Bears, as well as a number of other unfamiliar cartoon characters. This must have been the kids' room, back when this safe house in the middle of a war zone was a family home.
8:55 John Hopkins? Now, the cheerful environs are little more than a prison cell.
9:01 Speaker 04 They handcuffed me and just kind of lying me down in this bedroom. And I knew there were two other guys in that room, young guys which were going to become people I spent a lot of time with. Then they were telling me there was a misunderstanding and they was going to be fine. But they're just playing with you, that's all.
9:20 John Hopkins? Dozens of questions and doubts present themselves. What exactly do his captors want with him? Is he a hostage that they can ransom for cash? A valuable commodity they have every incentive to care for? Or is he a sacrificial lamb waiting for slaughter?
9:38 Speaker 04 Your brain is in complete disarray. So from one second to the next, you can think way too terrible, right? And that was a constant up and down, which is actually truly exhausting psychologically.
9:53 John Hopkins? Within the first few hours, Jonathan is kicked and abused, and then suddenly given some hot food.
10:00 John Hopkins? This fluctuation between cruelty and kindness sets the tone for what's to come. The emotional and psychological seesaw is more than he can cope with.
10:12 John Hopkins? He passes out on the bedroom floor.
10:20 John Hopkins? That night, the two fixers, Al Farouk and the so-called "no problem", are driven away in the SUV.
10:29 John Hopkins? Jonathan will never see either of them again, so he'll never know for sure what happened, who betrayed him, or how exactly the deception was orchestrated.
10:38 John Hopkins? The only thing that's certain is that he is now alone and in the greatest peril of his life.
10:49 John Hopkins? So how did Jonathan find himself here?
10:53 John Hopkins? Born in France but largely educated in America, Jonathan studied ancient history before going on to work for local newspapers in Chicago.
11:02 John Hopkins? In his early twenties, he began travelling with his job, becoming a distinguished photojournalist covering conflicts in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East.
11:12 John Hopkins? Now in his mid-thirties and a seasoned war photographer, he's had more than his share of close shaves. On a previous trip to Syria, for example, he witnessed the early stages of the country's civil war between its authoritarian leader, Bashar al-Assad, and the rebel groups opposing him. During this visit, Jonathan and his friend Georgios narrowly escaped being blown to pieces by government forces.
11:40 Speaker 04 I was already pretty experienced in covering conflicts, but I had a feeling this was a different level in terms of the intensity of the fighting. When it started, very quickly I went in with a buddy of mine, a Greek photographer. And what I remember the most is how disorganized the rebellion was at the time. We didn't really have any trust in their abilities to fight. We were staying with a bunch of rebels, and I just had a bad feeling about these guys, so we ended up forcing them to have us relocate. And the next day, they were all killed. They got hit by a tank shell.
12:16 John Hopkins? If Jonathan had not trusted his gut and moved away from the group, he too would have perished. The threat of death is constant in a country ravaged by war.
12:28 John Hopkins? So, when a chance to return to Syria presented itself, his mother begged him not to go.
12:37 Speaker 04 My mother is a bit of a witch in the sense that she is able to read things. I mean, her sensibility of her surrounding is quite attuned. So I usually listen to her. This time I didn't. My mother raised me very independently. So the consequence of that is you create a human being who's like her fiercely independent. So I was going to make my own way.
13:01 John Hopkins? Not that Jonathan is blasé about the risks his job entails.
13:05 Speaker 04 I'm always anxious before I go to a place. So I've cancelled trips. I've done now, just didn't feel it, so I didn't do it. Especially when I physically leave my house and I lock the door. And then I always tell myself, oh, Jonathan, maybe just don't go. And you just go home and, you know, move on and do something else.
13:25 John Hopkins? When it comes to Syria, Jonathan has always tried to play it safe. Although for a war photographer, safe is very much a relative term.
13:34 John Hopkins? On his previous trips, he photographed affected areas, but stayed more on the fringes of the conflict.
13:41 John Hopkins? This time around, however, he is taking a different route.
13:45 Speaker 04 So I decided to push the envelope a little bit. And I went to an area which was an hour and a half north of Damascus. And in order to get there, you have to go through Lebanon. And that itself is tricky. But I had very good contacts in Lebanon, a very powerful Christian family from the north. And they had many contacts. And the other ones who set things up for me to enter the war zones and get picked up by rebels and end up at the front lines.
14:11 John Hopkins? It's Jonathan's Lebanese contacts who introduced him to his fixer, Al Farouk, and even offered to pay for his services.
14:20 Speaker 04 Let's give you a little context. When I was covering the Battle of Mosul in northern Iraq, the average price for daily rate for a fixer to go to the front was 800 bucks a day. Now you have better ones and lesser ones, and it's a business. The good ones, they charge more. That fixer in Syria was a friend of these contacts I had in Lebanon. So I didn't have to pay for it. It was a favor to me. And he was a local guy with a motorcycle. So we would get around on a motorcycle. Every time there was bombing and stuff like that, we'd just go shoot it. And then at night, come back and file for my agency at the time.
14:57 John Hopkins? Together Jonathan and Al Farouk have visited local bomb sites, hospitals and morgues, paying witness to the devastating consequences of the regime's attacks on the area. But after a week or so, Jonathan started to believe he could do better.
15:15 Speaker 04 After a while, it got just, photographically, just the same. Photography is, it's a big responsibility because you only represent a very fraction of a reality, which is that frame that you photographed. And you also are responsible when it comes to the violence that you want to show. In my opinion, a good photographer, a good photo does not show death and violence straight up. That's easy, everybody can do that. It's the insinuation of something, in my opinion, that's much more powerful. In the same way that when you see an impactful movie and the end leaves you wondering. And then your imagination, the symbolic part of your brain kicks in and tries to understand
16:00 Speaker 04 or imagine something. And I think it's the same for photography. If you can insinuate things more than just being right in your face, I think that's a better talent.
16:12 John Hopkins? With this goal in mind, Jonathan felt it was important for him to get up close with the rebel fighters.
16:19 Speaker 04 The idea was to get closer to the front, another front really, where there was more infantry clashes, I was looking for that. That was the idea, to embed me with another group that was actually a bit more active tactically, that was more interesting for me.
16:33 John Hopkins? This endeavor was obviously always going to be high risk, but Jonathan could have no idea where it would lead him. Betrayed, blindfolded, and whisked away by masked men.
16:46 John Hopkins? And now he is more immersed in the action than ever before. Handcuffed to a bunk bed, with guns pointed at his head.
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18:00 John Hopkins? By the time dawn breaks on Jonathan's first morning in captivity, his two fixes, his two allies, are both out of the picture.
18:09 John Hopkins? He's all alone with just the motley band of soldiers who have captured him for company.
18:15 John Hopkins? What exactly this dangerous group of rebels wants with him is still murky.
18:21 John Hopkins? Under their control, time becomes warped. Days merge together as things quickly settle into a depressingly familiar routine.
18:30 Speaker 04 I was getting tortured almost every day for a while. The guys were ordered to. I don't think they took pleasure in it. They would take me to the living room and they would just get a beating there. It was just like, they broke my ribs, two of them. And actually, I played on that because, I mean, it was very painful and I couldn't breathe. But I even acted a little more. So they would feel bad about it. And then it stopped. And it was weird because they would do it. And then when they were done, they were like, hey. I would eat with them and they would give me a cigarette. You know, when it's happening, it's okay. It was more like the anticipation of when it would happen again. That was the issue. Otherwise, when it's happening, you just bite your lip and take it. That's how I viewed it. And then it's weird because it would end and then they would be friendly with me
19:15 Speaker 04 and I would be okay with that.
19:18 John Hopkins? In between beatings, Jonathan gets to know his captors better. Some of them speak a little English, and they're keen to learn more. One young man, Mej, starts swapping vocab with him, teaching Jonathan words in Arabic in exchange for their English translations.
19:37 Speaker 04 Most of them were actually quite nice kids. The irony of it all. They were nice guys. There was one called Habia, I remember. He was a young guy. He was eighteen. He was always very nice to me. Mej, he was the other one in the bedroom. He was also very nice. These guys were more curious about me than anything else. And they would ask me all these questions, and often they were asking me about women. I remember Mej asked me to take a picture of him with his cellphone, because he had a woman he liked in another village. And they're asking me advice how to talk to her. So I actually got a bit intimate with these guys.
20:12 John Hopkins? To the Syrian teenagers, this photojournalist who lives in New York City is an intriguing curiosity. Tall, handsome, pale-skinned.
20:24 John Hopkins? But at one point, while the group is gathered around a grainy TV screen, Jonathan's all-American good looks threaten to land him in hot water.
20:35 Speaker 04 They had this TV, and because we were close to the Lebanese border, they could catch channels, and they were playing the Green Lantern. And I'll never forget, they looked at me like this, and they were like pointing at the TV.
20:46 John Hopkins? The Syrians are the first ones to notice that Jonathan bears a passing resemblance to the Green Lantern star, Hollywood actor Ryan Reynolds. Not exactly a look-alike, but to young men who've never seen a Westerner in the flesh before.
21:01 Speaker 04 That got me really worried. Because the first thing that clicked into my mind was, I'm going to become more expensive, because they think I'm a famous actor, and I'm not. And I kept telling them, this is someone else, and they really weren't sure. I think, a lot of those guys are local peasants. Like, there's local guys, you know? They've never left their village that kind, so they're genuine in that sense, but they're a bit naive.
21:26 John Hopkins? If the Syrians believe Jonathan to be a celebrity, they may demand outlandish sums of money to release him.
21:33 John Hopkins? It takes all of his powers of persuasion to convince them that they haven't actually kidnapped the Green Lantern. But it turns out their leader, an overweight man called Abu Talal, has developed a new, even more unsettling theory about him.
21:49 John Hopkins? He's not a war photographer at all. He's a CIA agent.
21:53 Speaker 04 They were more worried about CIA, stuff like that. Which is always a possibility. Our profession is a good cover. It's happened, so, you know, why not? I was really worried about being accused of being a spy and therefore my situation would be far worse than it would be if I was just a photographer.
22:15 John Hopkins? One day Jonathan is led, blindfolded, into the living room.
22:21 John Hopkins? When the kefir is whipped off his head, he finds an audience, ready and waiting.
22:28 John Hopkins? Twenty rebels at least, sat around in a semicircle, with expectant looks on their faces.
22:36 John Hopkins? If not for the thick beards and army uniforms, they might be a class of schoolkids on a visit to the theatre. The show they're about to see is an intense one.
22:48 John Hopkins? The interrogation begins. Shouting, fists, bangs on the table. The rebels demand to know if Jonathan is a spy.
22:58 Speaker 04 Asking me these questions over and over, thinking that I would break and just give up, but I never did. Like, I never broke mentally. I was like, I'm not gonna give them what they want because then I'm even more screwed. And trust me, they tried. I wonder if they respected that somehow because I was like holding tough, you know? Some of the guys were looking at me differently after that.
23:20 John Hopkins? A week later Abu Talal brings out the big guns.
23:24 John Hopkins? Although in this case, the biggest gun available is actually a simple kitchen knife.
23:31 John Hopkins? This time, there's no crowd gathered in the living room. Just a couple of chairs either side of a wooden table.
23:39 John Hopkins? Jonathan takes a seat, opposite a man in a desert khaki camouflage uniform.
23:45 John Hopkins? Then in comes one of his regular guards, an older man who he thinks used to be a police officer. The last time he saw this particular jailer, the two of them shared a cigarette.
23:57 John Hopkins? Now though, the former Bobby is very much in bad cop mode.
24:02 John Hopkins? He walks over to the table with a stony look on his face and a large kitchen knife in each hand.
24:10 John Hopkins? As Jonathan watches, his eyes wide open, the man begins sharpening the blades against each other.
24:18 John Hopkins? Then suddenly, he sets one of the knives down on the table and walks around until he is standing directly behind Jonathan.
24:26 John Hopkins? He feels a strong hand grabbing him by the hair, pulling his head backwards, exposing his neck.
24:33 Speaker 04 You're trembling, right? Like your whole body is, it kind of collapses on itself. It's almost like you're an animal. And that leaves a very long-term impression which does not really dwindle over time.
24:48 John Hopkins? He can feel the cold metal against his skin, the pressure of the blade.
24:56 John Hopkins? After the longest few seconds of Jonathan's life, his captor withdraws the knife and releases him. Then casually takes a seat at the table.
25:06 Speaker 04 I tremble for the rest of the day. You feel cold, you're exhausted, and it's a bit like when you, you took a very cold shower and you can't warm up after that. It's a bit like that. That man, he was an older guy, I remember. After that, he was always super nice to me. Didn't want to have anything to do with him, but he would come up to me, he's like, "It's okay, you know, it's just a game." "You son of a bitch." I'm like, "Okay."
25:29 Speaker 04 But yeah, it was, that was tough.
25:33 John Hopkins? While the kidnappers learn more about Jonathan, eventually giving up on the idea that he's secretly a CIA spy, he is learning more about them, too. Including where exactly they fit in the pantheon of rebel groups currently fighting the Assad regime. Fortunately for him, these guys are not religious extremists, not jihadists. Their interest in him is purely financial.
26:00 Speaker 04 There are different degrees. You know, you have ISIS, Al-Nusra, and then it goes down the ladder to opportunistic criminal gangs who are operating in Syria. These guys, I would say, were pretty regular guys. They were Muslims, but a historical context in which they found themselves in to force them to make a decision. You join, you don't, you flee to Turkey, whatever you decide to do. So yes, I was very lucky for that.
26:25 John Hopkins? The threat of death still hangs heavy in the air. But the more time Jonathan spends with his captors, the more it seems they don't want any real harm to come to him, if they can help it. And so, with his life in the rebels' hands, he might as well try to get on with them. But it's more than that. He begins to genuinely like them as well.
26:49 Speaker 04 I did befriend most of them. It was a conscious decision for them to see me more as a human being rather than just merchandise, which you are, this is pretty much what you are, you're worth money.
27:03 John Hopkins? But even if his captors value him more alive than dead, there are other extreme external dangers to contend with. The war outside grows increasingly heavy. Strapped to the bed most of the days, Jonathan is a sitting duck. In the darkness beneath his blindfold, he can feel the ground vibrate and hear bone-shattering explosions tearing through the hard earth just outside. The safe house begins suffering serious damage from government shelling.
27:37 Speaker 04 When I was handcuffed and blindfolded and there was heavy shelling, that was bad because I couldn't see and the windows were breaking or trembling and then it was like this, the explosions and everything and the machine gun fire and stuff like that. You're just sitting there, you have no idea what the hell is going on. So that was tough. I knew I was gonna get killed like that, not by them, but by government forces just bombing the hell out of us. So at the end, they were dealing with losing a battle and they had to take care of me. And I think for them, that was a logistical nightmare.
28:13 John Hopkins? A logistical nightmare, a liability, a burden.
28:19 John Hopkins? In the eyes of his captors, Jonathan might suddenly be more trouble than he's worth.
28:24 John Hopkins? So far, there has been no specific talk of a ransom.
28:28 John Hopkins? It's not clear they even know how to go about negotiating one.
28:32 John Hopkins? And if that is the case, there's one very dangerous potential alternative.
28:38 John Hopkins? The gang might decide to sell him to another group instead. One less invested in keeping their merchandise alive and well, and more interested in making a spectacle of him.
28:52 Speaker 04 There were other groups that were trying to buy me. And they were much more hardcore Islamists and that would have been a different story altogether.
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30:10 John Hopkins? One night, after three weeks in captivity, Jonathan is sleeping uncomfortably in his creaky bed.
30:17 John Hopkins? For once, all is still and silent, save for the odd light whistle of wind.
30:24 John Hopkins? Suddenly, in the blackness, there is a shuffle of feet. Jonathan is shaken awake and told to put on some clothes.
30:32 John Hopkins? Groggy, he pulls himself up and gets himself together as quickly as he can. As soon as he's ready, one of his captors roughly grabs him by the bicep and drags him to an SUV parked outside the safe house.
30:46 John Hopkins? There is a somber look on his jailer's face. He barely looks at Jonathan as he's bundled into the backseat. The engine rumbles into life when they're away.
30:57 John Hopkins? As they speed through the night, Jonathan has no idea if he'll ever return.
31:04 Speaker 04 I thought I was being executed. I didn't know. They don't tell you. You fall into this black hole and you're... The anxiety level is very intense because you don't know.
31:17 John Hopkins? The wheels spin across the dirt-laden ground as Jonathan is taken to who knows where.
31:24 John Hopkins? He can barely breathe.
31:27 John Hopkins? But then, after a short drive, the SUV pulls up outside the gates of a large villa.
31:34 John Hopkins? Jonathan is pulled out of the car and escorted inside.
31:38 John Hopkins? Compared to the dingy, abandoned safe house, this new home is a palace.
31:44 Speaker 04 The second house were basically nice villas that were emptied out because of the fighting. And suddenly you realize it's being relocated.
31:52 John Hopkins? With the old safe house under constant bombardment, the rebels have decided to move Jonathan to a safer position, just up the road from their own HQ.
32:01 John Hopkins? The handsome, sprawling villas here even have pools.
32:06 John Hopkins? But while the decor might be a little more salubrious, there's no escaping the fact that there's a war on. For a start, every room is stacked with weapons, from 9mm pistols to AK-47s, even RPG launchers.
32:22 John Hopkins? As he gorps at the extensive armoury, a wild thought presents itself.
32:29 John Hopkins? If Jonathan grabbed one of these guns now, he could probably take out his jailers in one fell swoop.
32:36 John Hopkins? But the idea quickly dissipates, as he's taken to a bedroom and swiftly restrained again.
32:43 John Hopkins? They've given him a longer leash than before, but it's still attached to the bars on the bedroom window. He's still alive, but freedom appears no nearer.
32:56 John Hopkins? The rebels, at any rate, don't appear to view Jonathan as a threat. As the days go by, he has afforded more small luxuries. They even let him swim in one of the pools.
33:09 John Hopkins? It's the closest Jonathan has felt to his old life since he came to Syria a month earlier.
33:16 Speaker 04 I was doing laps on my back and I remember looking at the blue sky and for a brief second I felt free, just that moment.
33:24 John Hopkins? The rebels, meanwhile, are impressed with Jonathan's form in the water. He's been an avid swimmer since childhood, qualifying for the Junior Olympics at high school, and later joining a competitive water polo team.
33:38 John Hopkins? One day, the local warlord approaches him with a surprising request.
33:44 John Hopkins? He asks Jonathan to teach him how to swim.
33:49 John Hopkins? His name is Esad, not to be confused with Assad, the Syrian dictator. A heavyset, hairy fellow, he is in charge of around a thousand rebels in the area.
34:00 John Hopkins? And in a pair of bright orange and red shorts, he cuts quite a figure on the poolside.
34:05 Speaker 04 The warlord showed up in a wine swim trunks, and you can't make this up. And I had to teach him how to swim, while all the soldiers and officers were around the pool laughing because he went from being the local warlord to being someone I was holding in my arms just trying to have him float instead of sink right to the bottom.
34:28 John Hopkins? Soon, the warlord's swimming lessons have become a regular part of Jonathan's routine.
34:34 John Hopkins? And Esad begins spending time at the villa where Jonathan is staying too, joining the men charged with guarding the Westner in their regular prayer sessions.
34:44 John Hopkins? A somewhat lapsed Catholic, Jonathan has been getting back in touch with his own beliefs recently. So when his captors invite him to join them in prayer, he agrees. Though while the men around him praise Allah, Jonathan focuses on his own faith.
35:01 Speaker 04 I was reciting Christian Catholic prayers after when I was a kid, and that was a bit of a rebellion because that was quite blasphemous to do something like this with them. And so that was a bit of a resistance, purely for me. It didn't mean anything else to anyone else.
35:21 John Hopkins? It's dusk.
35:24 John Hopkins? Jonathan is praying alone on a balcony overlooking the valley towards Lebanon, five kilometers away.
35:32 John Hopkins? He sits on a white plastic garden chair, waiting for the sun to set.
35:38 John Hopkins? It's become a daily ritual, a key part of his new routine.
35:44 John Hopkins? When the sun hits the peak of a particular mountain, he always begins reciting the Lord's Prayer.
35:51 John Hopkins? He murmurs, "Our Father, who art in heaven..."
35:57 John Hopkins? But this time, his devotion is interrupted by a visit from two of his young jailers.
36:04 John Hopkins? They have something to tell him, something that's hard to believe.
36:09 Speaker 06 Rabia and Noor came up on the balcony I was in and told me, "Oh, you're free, you're free." Told me I was gonna be released. I didn't believe it, but they kind of rushed me and I grabbed whatever I had, which is not much. And they put me in a car and they drove me away. It was very quick. I just remember turning around, I was in the backseat of this SUV car. And I remember Meir, Rabia, and Noor just waving at me goodbye like I was leaving as summer came.
36:37 John Hopkins? It's a surreal sight as Jonathan looks out of the car's back window, his youthful Syrian captors bidding him a fond farewell.
36:46 John Hopkins? By this point, he knows not to count his chickens before they're hatched. The idea that he's really on his way home to New York seems distinctly far-fetched.
36:55 John Hopkins? They bump along desert roads. Rocks and rubble fly upwards, dislodged by the wheels of the car.
37:04 John Hopkins? In time, they arrive in the city of Yabru, not far from where Jonathan was kidnapped two months earlier.
37:11 John Hopkins? The SUV pulls up outside an apartment block.
37:16 John Hopkins? Two of the men traveling with him go inside.
37:19 John Hopkins? Jonathan is left to wait in the vehicle.
37:23 John Hopkins? Ten minutes pass, twenty, an hour.
37:28 John Hopkins? Eventually, they return and tell him to follow them inside.
37:32 John Hopkins? They bring him to a living room.
37:35 John Hopkins? A group of men are sat around in the midst of an animated conversation.
37:40 John Hopkins? Jonathan has no idea what they're saying, but it's clear some kind of negotiation is taking place.
37:47 John Hopkins? And it doesn't take him long to realize that he is the merchandise being haggled over.
37:54 John Hopkins? Even more worrying, the men bartering over him right now are dressed in the characteristic black uniforms of the Shabia, a shadowy militia known to be fiercely loyal to the Assad regime.
38:06 John Hopkins? Unlike the rebels, these guys are neatly dressed and clean-shaven. One of them even sports a pair of Ray-Ban aviator sunglasses. But their reputation for brutality precedes them. The Shabia are known for their sadistic methods of torture.
38:23 John Hopkins? And compared to the ragtag band of outlaws Jonathan's been staying with the past couple of months, these are the professionals.
38:31 Speaker 06 It was like twenty of them, all heavily armed, all dressed in black, like military uniforms. And I knew these were government guys, and I was being sold to the government, and then I started freaking out.
38:42 John Hopkins? The deal is done, and Jonathan is handed over. But his new captors don't behave in the way their brutal reputation suggests they might.
38:52 John Hopkins? Sitting in the back of another SUV, Jonathan is handed a black cap and uniform, just like theirs, to help him blend in.
39:01 John Hopkins? Then he receives some polite but firm instructions.
39:06 John Hopkins? "When we get to a checkpoint, keep your mouth shut."
39:10 John Hopkins? He does as he's told.
39:19 John Hopkins? Sure enough, soon they're breezing through checkpoint after checkpoint, heading out of rebel territory and closer to the heart of the regime. Before long, they're approaching the Syrian capital, Damascus.
39:34 John Hopkins? "It's okay," the guy in the Ray-Bans tells him, "you're safe now." Then he adds, not entirely convincingly, "You're with the good guys."
39:45 John Hopkins? He hands Jonathan his mobile phone. There's a message on the screen from a wealthy local who claims to have paid his $450,000 ransom.
39:55 John Hopkins? "You're free," it reads. "You're a very lucky man."
40:01 John Hopkins? Jonathan texts back awkwardly, "Thank you." Still, not entirely sure he can trust what he's being told.
40:10 John Hopkins? The SUV wends through the streets of the city. As they approach a wealthy neighborhood, Jonathan spots a large shopping mall up ahead. They pull into the car park, and the guy in the sunglasses goes inside.
40:23 John Hopkins? He emerges half an hour later, wheeling a heavy case behind him. He has bought supplies for Jonathan: clean clothes, toothpaste.
40:32 John Hopkins? Perhaps they really are here to help him.
40:36 John Hopkins? Not long after, they arrive at the plush house of Jonathan's mysterious benefactor.
40:43 Speaker 06 I met the guy who paid my ransom, and the Lebanese politician who had convinced him to do so.
40:50 John Hopkins? The full ins and outs of Jonathan's release are unclear. In times of war, things often are. But it seems his benefactor, a man named Mr. Abud, is a local oligarch who has paid these black-clad militia men to deliver the ransom money and then deliver Jonathan safely to him.
41:09 John Hopkins? He is acting for himself in this matter, not the government. Though his precise motives aren't entirely obvious.
41:17 John Hopkins? Perhaps he and the Lebanese politician who convinced him to act hoped to gain international favor. Jonathan's kidnapping is a high-profile one after all, and helping out in this matter may prove beneficial down the line.
41:32 John Hopkins? Who knows?
41:34 John Hopkins? Whatever the case, Jonathan can finally breathe a little easier.
41:39 Speaker 06 My level of anxiety decreased quite a bit once I got into that house because, first of all, as I entered the massive living room, there was CNN on, on this massive big-screen TV. The data alone, for some reason, you know, it's something familiar, right? So it brings down the anxiety. And then there was a banquet of incredible food and dishes. Amazing, and also I hadn't eaten well in months.
42:07 John Hopkins? But Jonathan's ordeal isn't over quite yet. He still has to get back across the border into Lebanon.
42:14 John Hopkins? Fortunately, his new friends have a plan for that as well.
42:19 John Hopkins? Abud personally drives him to the Lebanese border. When they get there, he pops open the boot of his car and tells Jonathan to get inside.
42:31 John Hopkins? Aboud will have to pay off the guards on the Lebanese side. Jonathan just has to stay quiet and hope it all works out.
42:39 Speaker 06 I was ready to go. And there was no anxiety in it. It was just, I was ready for the plan and whatever I needed to do, I would do it. So I was very much on board. I didn't hesitate. It really felt like this was the real thing. And that finally I was going to be free. So this was a complete switch in my psyche.
42:58 John Hopkins? For the next fifteen minutes, Jonathan waits in the darkness of the trunk, listening to the sound of border guards questioning his driver in Arabic.
43:07 John Hopkins? Eventually, they are on their way again.
43:11 John Hopkins? A few miles down the road, they pull over and the lid springs open.
43:16 John Hopkins? In the early morning light, Jonathan clambers out, stretches his aching limbs, and breathes in the fresh, cool air of a Lebanese dawn.
43:27 John Hopkins? While his benefactor turns around and heads back to Syria, Jonathan is placed into another vehicle by two of the wealthy man's associates, armed goons, who, despite their friendly demeanor and sharp suits, look like they know how to handle themselves.
43:43 John Hopkins? It's an hour's drive to downtown Beirut. The men lead Jonathan up to a penthouse apartment a stone's throw from the beach.
43:52 John Hopkins? From the balcony, he can see the sun glinting on the eastern Mediterranean.
43:59 John Hopkins? But there'll be no swimming today. The guards tell him to stay put while their friends square things with the Lebanese authorities on his behalf. In the meantime, they'll be keeping an eye on him.
44:14 John Hopkins? They do at least give Jonathan a mobile phone, so he can let his parents know that he's alive.
44:21 John Hopkins? His father almost collapses from the shock.
44:25 John Hopkins? For the past two months, he has been working with Jonathan's contacts in Lebanon, trying to get him released and having to make horrible decisions in the process.
44:35 John Hopkins? Because things almost got very bad.
44:39 John Hopkins? As Jonathan once feared, an extremist Islamist group were indeed planning on buying him. And his father was prepping some drastic plans before that happened.
44:49 Speaker 06 What I found out through my father is that there was a plan to attack the village where I was being held and kill my captors and freedom, bring me back to Lebanon. About 150 soldiers, mercenaries, paid for on the border, and they were ready to go. Fortunately, I was released a day or two before the assault was launched.
45:15 John Hopkins? Right now Jonathan may be out of harm's way, but he is still under lock and key, guarded by burly men carrying guns.
45:24 John Hopkins? And there's no knowing when, or even if, they'll get around to actually sending him back home.
45:30 John Hopkins? But not long after speaking to his father, he receives a call from the French ambassador to Lebanon.
45:37 John Hopkins? "Are you able to leave?" he asks. "Can you make an escape?" Jonathan tells him, "I think so."
45:47 John Hopkins? The ambassador instructs him to make his way to the Four Seasons Hotel, about 100 yards down the street from the apartment block. Someone from the embassy will meet him there.
46:00 John Hopkins? Jonathan picks his moment carefully, waiting until the guards are enjoying a cigarette on the balcony before making a run for it.
46:07 Speaker 06 The feeling of freedom that I had there was so intense that no one was going to stop me. And I rushed to the Four Seasons and the police officers were already there. They grabbed me and they put me back in their car and they drove to the French embassy.
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47:26 John Hopkins? After 81 days as a hostage, the French Embassy is a balm to both body and soul.
47:33 John Hopkins? Housed in a 100-year-old Ottoman palace, it's a far cry from the shell-damaged safehouses Jonathan's been living in for the past two months.
47:42 John Hopkins? He spends his days doing laps in the embassy pool, surrounded by palm trees, and his evenings dining with the French ambassador and his wife.
47:52 John Hopkins? But despite the luxurious environs, Jonathan finds it hard to relax.
47:59 Speaker 06 The first night I spoke at the embassy, when I woke up, I had this insane panic at that because I opened my eyes and I didn't know where I was. My brain, for some reason, could not put the two together, and I'm looking around the room and I still don't know where I am. It took about 20 minutes. It was a very weird 20 minutes, but I panicked completely and I had no idea where I was.
48:20 John Hopkins? Jonathan will have to stay at the embassy for a while, until his legal problems are ironed out.
48:26 John Hopkins? Many people want to speak to him, including the FBI. For the second time in two months, he has to fend off accusations that he is secretly a foreign agent.
48:38 Speaker 06 They were worried that if I had converted or something, they did ask me and I said no. It is protocol for them to find out. Because if they do, if they do turn you into something else, then they have a security problem. So it's normal for them to find out, but they realized very quickly that they had nothing to fear.
48:59 John Hopkins? After five days as a guest of the French ambassador, Jonathan's legal problems are all sorted. He is free to catch a plane back to Paris. And from there, to his home in New York. Finally, his ordeal is really over.
49:15 Speaker 06 I consider myself a very resilient individual, so I'm often able to bounce back very quickly. Now, obviously, you never come back the same. Some kidnappings are worse than others. Mine was brutal because of the fighting. Some of the torturing, it was only three months, right? Some of these other guys in Raqqa, they got captured for two years. So I was lucky in that sense.
49:39 John Hopkins? Back in New York, Jonathan begins working with an organization that helps the families of kidnapped Americans in Syria and other war zones around the world.
49:49 John Hopkins? Through this work, he even meets President Obama. He also meets Diane Foley, whose son, James, a US journalist, was kidnapped in Syria the previous year.
50:00 John Hopkins? After being held for over two years, Foley is murdered by Islamic State.
50:06 John Hopkins? In August 2014, they release a video of his execution in the Syrian desert, titled "A Message to America."
50:14 John Hopkins? It is a case of "There but for the grace of God go I."
50:27 John Hopkins? Despite the ever-present dangers and despite his kidnapping, Jonathan continues his photography work today. Not taking a backward step, he's gone on to cover the war in Ukraine. Though his experiences in Syria have left an indelible mark.
50:44 Speaker 04 It stays with you. Every time I hear firecrackers or even thunder, or even a subway coming, it just kicks me right back in. I just remember these moments, and there are many of them, of going through shelling. And that always gets to me. There's no way around it. I think I will always have that. Soldiers have that. It's normal. So there are consequences of these kinds of experiences.
51:08 John Hopkins? Looking back, Jonathan says he attributes his survival in Syria to one thing above all else: Luck.
51:17 Speaker 06 Things could have gone away, and I would still be there dead. Some people believe in a greater good, whether it's God or the universe, or the cosmos as a whole, or just pure luck or circumstances. I don't know what it is, but when you look into the details of it, that should not be real. I mean, it's just unbelievable to me.
51:48 John Hopkins? In the next episode, we meet Mick Dolman, a seafarer from Melbourne, Australia.
51:55 John Hopkins? In October 1973, Mick boards the Blythe Star, a merchant vessel docked in Tasmania. It's due to sail from the port of Hobart to the northwest of the island. The journey's scheduled to take two days. But Mick will end up at sea for far longer than that, as he and his crewmates find themselves stranded in a vulnerable life raft. The hellish experience will involve near starvation, brutal weather, physical turmoil, and tragedy, as it becomes apparent that survival won't be possible for everyone on board.
52:33 John Hopkins? That's next time on Real Survival Stories. Listen today without ads and without waiting a week by joining Noiser Plus. Click the subscription banner at the top of the feed to get started.
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