It was a call between the leader of a country celebrating its independence and the leader of a nation fighting for independence against a mighty power. As Israelis were celebrating their 74th Independence Day, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy surprised Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett with a phone call in the late evening hours of May 4. Bennett was at home with his family in the suburban Tel Aviv town of Raanana. Kyiv-born Housing Minister Ze’ev Elkin, who was out celebrating with his wife at an event in Tel Aviv, was patched into the call to serve as interpreter. Zelenskyy could hear the partying in the background through Elkin’s cell phone. Elkin took a selfie of himself with his wife as he held the phone to his ear.

Zelenskyy asked Bennett to contact Russian President Vladimir Putin and ask him to approve the evacuation of the women and children besieged in the Azovstal steel factory in the destroyed city of Mariupol. The two men discussed how Putin could be persuaded to also allow the evacuation of wounded combatants from the site. Bennett promised to help.

A few days previously, a diplomatic crisis erupted between Israel and Russia over claims by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that Hitler was partly Jewish as were some of the world’s greatest anti-Semites, a reference to Zelenskyy’s alleged Nazi ideology despite his Jewish roots.

The following morning, May 5, Bennett called the Kremlin. Despite the diplomatic crisis between the sides and the harsh condemnations of Lavrov by Bennett himself, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, Finance Minister Avigdor Liberman and many others, Putin called back within a few hours. He agreed to allow the evacuation of civilians but not combatants, even wounded ones trapped in the plant.