12/10/2023
This is the testimony of Noa Ben Barak,my friend, who was saved from the inferno that hit Kibutz Be'eri on October 7th, 2023:
Trigger alert: graphic description of events in Kibbutz Be'eri
On Saturday at 6 am, I heard a big boom of the door opening from the top floor where myself and my brother, Uri, were asleep. “Do you want to go down to the safe room?”, my brother asked me? It sounds like we are attacking. This is what we were both thinking. I closed the door of the top floor and went down to the safe room wearing my pajamas (I was lucky enough to wear sandals). On the top floor, in my bag, was my jewelry, keys, photos, documents, and all my personal memorabilia. In the beginning, there were a few booms, and we were asked to stay in the safe room. After the first alarm, my mother had her coffee and smoked a cigarette on the front porch, like she always does. Luna, our dog, didn’t agree to enter the safe room after the alarm went off the second time. We received a message that terrorists were entering our kibbutz after we were already locked in the safe room. We double bolted the safe room, and my brother blocked the door with a bed stand. Not long later we heard Arabic screaming from the top floor and then we heard “Allahu Akbar” from the top floor. My brother suggested we move the piano and block the entrance to the safe room. I am writing briefly not to have a flashback. The terrorists tried to enter our home through the locked entrance door, and when they couldn’t enter it, they somehow blew up the wall of the house and entered through the bathroom through the shower. Was it a gr***de? Kicking? RPG? I don’t know. That was the disadvantage of not seeing anything, just hearing it all. At this hour, I asked whoever I could to send help on the Kibbutz What’s app group, influential family members, anyone, to send help. “They’re inside the house, please send help” as I was writing it, I was shaking. All I could think about was if someone was coming to help us.
The terrorist kicked the door of the safe room, and when we didn’t make a sound, they shot the door. I was under the piano, my mother was hiding on the bed, my brother was hiding between the piano and the wall. I bent in the fetal position, slowly being covered in sweat and tears, and urine from fear. “They are shooting at us; I am going to die.” I thought. When they couldn’t open the door, they lit a match and started a fire in our house. The smoke started to enter the safe room. We took some fabric and put water on top of them and put it on our faces. Later, we took wet shirts and put them on our faces. My brother put a wet shirt on the window. The safe room was full of smoke, and I had an anxiety attack over my mother, my brother, over the whole situation. My brother asked me if I wanted to leave the safe room when the terrorists were across the room. “No, I want to live. If we get out of here, they will kidnap me, take me to Gaza, r**e me, and kill all of us.” The understanding that I want to live, my brother resourcefulness, the quiet my mother kept for hours, this is what saved us.
My phone battery went out at about 11:00 in the morning, around noon they entered the house. For hours, they went in and out of the house. They were screaming, shooting the safe room door, the walls of the house, the window of the safe room, breaking the house, robbing it, laughing, cursing us, and listening to music. Those mother f**** felt at home in MY house. They went through my nephew’s games, broke everything, and light a fire. For 2 hours, they were trashing the house, and no one came to save us.
Around 3 in the afternoon, we heard the first shooting battle between our forces and the terrorists. We heard a Hebrew name and the forces started to surround the house, “Yacov, Yacov”, and that was the first name we heard in Hebrew that didn’t come from the safe room since 6 in the morning. After 2.5 hours of fire exchange, when the terrorists were walking in and out of the house, we heard voices in Hebrew and a big bang on the entrance door saying, “there’s a dog in the house”. They saw Luna in the house. We couldn’t get Luna in the safe room. I’m reminding myself to calm my guilt. “Is there somebody here” said someone in Hebrew. My brother asked him to identify himself. ‘I am sergeant Almog Edri from unit 932, I came to rescue you, I am here with my unit. Is anybody here?” We were screaming as loud as possible that we were here. They couldn’t open the door to the safe room, so we were rescued out from the window.
I couldn’t believe what I saw as we were leaving. The houses around were burning, and our home was wet because they tried to put out the fire. There was the most beautiful sunset on Earth, as always in the Kibbutz, but my mother’s beautiful neighborhood looked like a battlefield in Iraq. Everything was burnt and broken. My father’s car, parked next to the tank that covered us as we were running with the unit that protected us, was covered in blood. We were rescued to a safe space and then to a gathering area, and then to Tel Aviv. Our bus was shot at by terrorists near Allumim and then continued to Tel Aviv.
Yesterday, I found out that out of 8 families on our streets, we were one of 3 that were rescued and were taken safely from the inferno. Those are my memories in honor of all that were slaughtered in the Kibbutz Beeri. A prayer for those who were kidnapped, missing, and wounded. I don’t know yet all the names of the missing, the kidnapped and murdered. Names are slowly starting to be revealed, and my heart is burnt, together with our house and everything that used to be a beautiful Kibbutz. The first 2 days I had flashbacks and crazy physical pain, and I made it out of the loop by a treatment called EMDR, that is intended to be a quick first aid care for people with trauma and post trauma. If you can do it, please receive mental health today. This is a life saver and took me out of days of physical and mental hell. I am not answering the phone right now; if anyone wants to comment or talk, you can send me a What’s app message, and if my heart can handle it, I will write you back. Praise the Lord who is redeeming those in captivity. I wish it all will be over soon. Stay safe. Hug your beloved and take care of yourself. Our strength is in our unity and were all going through this s**t. Together, we will win.
