Israeli Teen Kidnapped By Family And Threatened With Death For Being Gay

Being a teenager and gay is hard whatever situation you’re in is hard, but for Angel, a 19 year old homosexual living in Tel Aviv, it recently turned into something that threatened his life when his family, who strongly oppose Angel’s lifestyle and sexuality took it upon themselves to kidnap him and threaten to kill him.

Having moved away from his family and the village he grew up in over a year ago, Angel had been starting to be able to truly live the life he wanted, but when his family discovered that this included working as a drag queen things soon changed, with Angel telling the Israel new site Ynet that:

“I started working as a drag-queen, and after my photos appeared on the internet, I started receiving threats,”

“At first they told me ‘take the pictures off the internet, or we’ll kill you.’ I was surprised, but moved on as usual. I had a good relationship with my family, so I ignored it,”

However it seems Angel was wrong to doubt their seriousness as three months ago, Angel’s relatives came and kidnapped him from Tel Aviv taking him back to this family’s house where “they threatened me, hit me and tied me in handcuffs.”

Managing to get free by contacting his friend who got in touch with the police, Angel returned to his life in Tel Aviv and continuing threats from his family, threats so bad that he considered filing a complaint but was talked out of it by his family. However after events last Monday, Angel decided enough was enough.

Explaining to Ynet that this time his relatives not only came to his house and kidnapped him, but also beat both him and his friend, he said:

“I was certain that I was going to die, and they also told me so,” he added,” Luckily my friend called the police, so by the time we reached the house the police came and rescued my life. I hope it never happens again.”

A horrific story that proves family love is far from the fairy tale unquestioning love we’d all like it to be, Angel doesn’t see any way forward with his family saying:

“They don’t understand the situation – it is unacceptable to them. They want me to get married; but I don’t care about these things. I just want to live my life the way I live it today.”

Source: Ynet Photo Credit: Yaron Brener