At present times, we cannot state with certainty wether deserted IDF soldier Abraham Kovalev is alive or not. He was last seen in Sidon, on October 15th 1990, by a Shin-Beth informer who positively identified our man despite the fact he was bearded and wearing traditional muslim clothing. The man was seen on his way back from a meeting with local Amal leaders, heading for the abandoned house - partly devastated by mortars - which he is occupying together with a significant number of war orphans of different confessions. What precisely sergeant Kovalev is trying to achieve remains undetermined. Rumors are various and contradictory. Some say he wants to establish an orphanage in Beyrout, others say he seeks to reach Syria and request asylum, yet others say he wants to lay the foundations of a new syncretic religion.
"Charismatic", "different", "silent", "introspected" are the words that were heard most frequently during our interviews with superiors or comrades who had known sergeant Kovalev before his defection. Modi'in officer Itzik Harosh was his direct superior in Marjayoun, South-Lebanon:
"Abraham was a paratrooper who never jumped off a plane, a washout: red beret but no wings pin. When he left his company he was assigned to the liaison unit and put under my command. He was doing what he was told. He learned arabic, took shifts in the communications room, assisted me in preparing and coordinating field data. He didn't talk much. In his free time he was reading books. I didn't know what they were about. They were in russian, you see."
Major sergeant Gili Ramon, a thermic radar operator, testifies:
"We were playing remote chess parties by radio, mostly at nighttime, during our respective shifts. Because I had to keep a permanent eye on the radar screen, he proposed we play by heart, without a board. He was an intriguing figure, very secret. On a bright night we climbed the roof of the munition hangar, and he pointed enthusiastically at dots in the sky, citing me their latin names. He told me we should come here again a week later to witness a Jovian eclipse. A Jovian eclipse, he told me, occurs when one of the Jupiter satellites passes into the shadow of its mother planet. I didn't know any of this, and to tell the truth I didn't see the point. But I was surprised that it was possible to witness such things with run-of-the mill army binoculars. He went on saying that timing the instant at which an occultation occurs - of which an eclipse is a special case - is one of the most accurate measurements amateur astronomers can make, and that many important discoveries - the rings of Uranus, the atmosphere around Pluto... - have been made by combining and plotting measurement results from different locations. He got me excited but on the said day he never showed up. He was already gone."
As a fit-for-combat soldier stationed in the buffer zone, sergeant Kovalev would regularly escort IDF personnel moving within the zone. On October 24st, 1998, he escorted base commander colonel Haim Katz to an ex-phalangistes family in Bintj Beil. Givati sergeant David Shabanov, who took part in the armed convoy, recalls:
"Influent lebanese families were used to invite our base commander around a well-dressed table. Sometimes we were allowed to take turns at the table, but most of the time we were waiting outside next to the GMC while they'd eat and discuss inside. Still, it was customary that members of the hosting family would bring us food. On that day, we were waiting outside the newly-built villa of the Jebayel family when a girl in an elaborately embroidered dress - at most sixteen years old - came outside with a plate and offered it to each of us. When she faced sergeant Kovalev, I noticed something strange in her behavior. She talked to him very fast, and she kept repeating, 'I know who you are...'. I saw sergeant Kovalev whisper something into her ear, and then she walked away silently. I asked him what it was all about, but he just nodded with his shoulders and said nothing."
Overt anti-IDF conduct was clearly evidenced once. Major sergeant Shlomo Katzen reports an incident during the escort of a suspected hizbollah collaborator that had to be transferred from the hospital in Marjayoun to detention center Al-K'hiam . Sergeant Kovalev was quoted to have said, "IDF occupies the territory, Shin Beth punishes it."
"A Shin-Beth officer who had heard what he had said started to insult him. Although sergeant Kovalev didn't respond verbally to the insults, he gave him a defiant and angered look. We pulled him away before it turned nasty."
Soldier Yossi Erez was Abraham Kovalev's closest friend. Transcript of his interview reads as follows:
"Marjayoun is packed with officers. In all the bases I'd known before, low grade soldiers were the bunch, officers the happy few. Here it's the opposite. Except for combat units securing the outpost, who'd shift every three months anyway, the vast majority of the personnel is high-graded, and totally oblivious to simple soldiers. I think this is the reason why Sergeant Kovalev offered me his friendship. We both knew we'd probably never see each other after those three months. We met under special circumstances. My company and I had just arrived to Marjayoun. We were called to participate in a special operation. We took position in a ruined building on a hill, two kilometers away from an enemy position. It was not an ambush, but an artillery mission. We were mere reinforcements. We had a long night before us, shelling would not start before dawn. At one point I noticed a light beam through a hole as big as a wall in the devastated building. It was sergeant Kovalev reading a book with a flashlight. I asked him what he was reading. Stories, he said. I said, well why don't you tell me one. He told me the story of a shaman who devoted his life to fabrication. In particular, he wanted to create a real man with the power of dreams. The shaman succeeds so well in his efforts that he becomes that man, but before dying, he realizes he was just another sorcerer's dream. That was typical of him. He often insisted on how the mind was a powerful and dangerous thing to play with. We went on talking about dreams and stuff, fantasizing about the possibility of monitoring mental activity so as to dream away our military service, but then authorization for shelling was signaled, and the place got filled with the drilling noise of mortars being shot out of the position. In the distance we heard machinegun and rifle fire being returned at us. They sounded like firecrackers. "Life is a dream", he said when the operation was finished. These were actually his grandmother's last words, a down-to-earth woman who lived and died in Moscow. He told me he always had them in mind and I believe that.
Yeah, he had a passion for astronomy. But what interested him, I think, was not so much the stars as the way they reveal themselves to humans. Their capacity to unite people and nations of the world. He believed breaching the secrets of the stars was the ultimate goal of mankind. No, I don't see a reason why he should have deserted. He was an idealist, that is certain. Most saw him as a weird fellow though. He had his twists. But I appreciated him. He was a great listener, although his compassion was often misunderstood as contempt. He used to smile a strange smile all along until you finished talking. It gave the impression he was only mildly interested in what you were saying. I'm quite sure he was unaware of the effect he produced on people."
Sergeant Kovalev's defection took place on the night of 25st October, 1990, with the assistance of SLA officer Jamal Niba.
"In a military base like Marjayoun, everybody knows each other after a while, even SLA and IDF soldiers. Sergeant Kovalev used to pop in our logistics office, to say hello and chat. We became friends. Generally, Israeli soldiers like to talk about politics, Kovalev liked to discuss religious matters. He knew our theology surprisingly well. He was fond of our patron saint, a hermit called Saint Maron who had chosen to live in open air, exposed to the extremes of the climate, in opposition to other hermits living in cells or caves. He had an interest in mysticism, I suppose. When he asked me to drive him to Jizzin, I warned him, as a friend, that it could get him into serious trouble. Israeli soldiers aren't allowed out of the base unless in secured convoys for operational purposes. Besides, Jizzin was officially outside IDF zone. He said he'd go anyway, and he'd appreciate if it was me who'd help him out of here."
Except for his binoculars, all IDF equipment, including rifle, was recovered from sergeant Kovalev's room. He had left the base in sports clothing. What left us puzzled in the first instance was the ease with which sergeant Kovalev made his way in the area, moving along, making contacts with rivaling militias, and staying alive. A hint of explanation to this might be the missing page of an otherwise blank notebook found in his room. Reconstitution of its content was achieved thanks to the imprints found on the empty page below it. The page that sergeant Kovalev apparently took with him contained data pertaining astronomical predictions for the whole year of 1990. It is possible that sergeant Kovalev is gaining food and shelter from muslims in rural areas by manipulating their religious beliefs, particularly on the theme of the return of Al Mahdi - the messiah - who is supposed to deliver the world after a long period of occultation. Sergeant Kovalev might present himself as a messenger bringing news about the twelfth imam, the Qua'im, which he supposedly reads in the sky. At this time of writing, sergeant Kovalev has left Sidon and his new destination remains unknown. We do not exclude the possibility he is dead.
Investigation continues.
