Original subtitles

¶¶

Murrow: Good evening. I'm Edward R. Murrow,

and this is a report on Israel.

But first, we would take a moment

to do a little geography.

In 1947, there was no Israel.

Palestine was then under a British mandate.

The United Nations then decided

to divide Israel

into two states,

one Arab, and one Jewish.

This report began

in a very tense area,

down at Gaza.

¶

This is dawn at Nahal Oz,

a kibbutz, a collective farm

on the Israeli side of the Gaza Strip.

Between Nahal Oz and Gaza on the hill,

is nothing more than a deep furrow.

(man singing)

Approximately 100 people live here.

It is manned by a youngster,

just out of the army,

because it is so close to the Gaza Strip,

and potentially part of the front.

Kibbutz means 'coming together'.

¶ (low dramatic music) ¶

¶¶

¶¶

Miri Tibon: I've always known that I want to

have family and raise children

in a smaller community.

And there's something about Nahal Oz,

when you go there, you just fall in love.

¶¶

Amir Tibon: A kibbutz is a place where

you don't have to step through your door,

to feel at home.

You're at home, once you enter

the grounds of the kibbutz.

¶¶

That's the first time you feel at home.

The entire community is your home.

¶¶

It's a very small place, but one with

a rather big history.

It's a place that always held

those heavy gates of Gaza.

¶¶

So I visited Nahal Oz

during the war of 2014 to write about it.

It was the most bombarded place in Israel.

And I, when I came to write my story,

I was expecting to enter

some kind of a military fortress.

And I entered this beautiful kibbutz.

Green lawns, flowers around the houses.

And after the war was over,

Nahal Oz was on the verge of disintegration.

There was a big departure

of families from the community.

And think about the message that would send

if this community fell

after such a history.

So I thought it was the right thing to do,

from an ideological standpoint,

to go and be part of

rebuilding that place.

And I knew that Miri had this

dream about one day moving to a kibbutz

and raising a family in a smaller,

tight-knit community.

So I asked her about it, and

at first she wasn't convinced.

Miri Tibon: Yeah, I was like, 'Well, I mean,

we said a small community,

but why on the border with Gaza,

and why Nahal Oz of all places?

I mean, since it's like one of the

closest places to the Gaza Strip.

(short laugh) Amir told me,

'Let's just go. You don't have to,

you know, commit to anything.

We'll just go and you'll see.'

But the place is so beautiful,

and the people are so nice.

It's something that is very special,

that you probably will not have in the city.

I was like, 'Okay,

we should come.'

¶¶

You know, we heard from the military

and from politicians about all this stuff

that's supposed to be, you know,

make the borders safe.

And also in Nahal Oz,

there was this thing that,

never, ever had a terrorist

come into Nahal Oz.

Amir Tibon: We trusted the military.

And when we moved there,

there was a constant presence of soldiers

inside the community.

But what happened over the years is that

we got to a point where, you had all these

cameras and machine guns and

automatic systems installed along the border fence,

but all the soldiers were removed from the community,

because the military, the government,

they all said, 'You don't need them anymore.'

You're in the safest place in the world,

and you don't need soldiers inside the kibbutz anymore.

¶¶

Miri Tibon: I mean, they told us,

'Even a butterfly cannot pass this fence

without us knowing.'

¶¶

And...we all believed it.

¶ (low ominous music) ¶

¶¶

¶¶

¶¶

¶¶

(inaudible shouting)

(inaudible chatter)

(motorcycle engine humming)

(inaudible chatter)

(motorcycle engine humming) (inaudible chatter)

¶ (low ominous music) ¶

(ticking stopwatch)

Amir Tibon: I woke up from hearing

the whistle of the mortar.

(mortar launch whistling)

(loud explosion)

And I elbowed Amir.

Amir? There's a mortar.

And we ran for the safe room

where Galia and Carmel,

three year old and a one and-a-half-year old,

were sleeping.

Amir Tibon: In Tel Aviv,

once an alarm goes off,

you have between 60 and 90 seconds to get shelter.

In Nahal Oz, you have between 5 and 7.

¶¶

If it's one missile,

one and done, so you stay in the safe room for 5 minutes,

it gets quiet, you go back to your life.

It's not even an instant, it's, it's a procedure.

Miri Tibon: Go to the safe room, close the door,

close the iron cover

of the window, (clang)

and stay there... a couple of minutes

until it's safe again.

(explosion)

(radio chatter) (explosion)

(radio chatter)

But between 6:29 and 7:15,

there was a very, very heavy bombarding,

that was very, very unusual.

Amir Tibon: Around 7 and 10 minutes,

we began to hear gunfire.

And at first, it was a little distant,

but it was close enough to

draw our attention.

And we exchanged this kind of

very concerned look between the two of us.

Miri Tibon: Like what, what is this?

This is new.

¶¶¶

(indistinct chatter)

And I recognize that it's automatic gunfire.

Israelis do not shoot

out of automatic gunfire.

Amir Tibon: It gets closer and closer.

As the minutes go by,

the gunfire is moving toward us.

Miri Tibon: And at 7:15, we hear it

right outside of our window.

(two loud gun shots)

And we hear people shout in Arabic.

(shouting in Arabic)

And I'm looking at a mirror and I'm telling him

they're here.

Amir Tibon: And we realize

this is not ending any time soon.

Ellie Rosenberg: Israel at war.

(explosion) Dozens of Hamas terrorists

infiltrating into Israel this morning,

taking citizens hostage,

roaming around the streets of Israeli towns,

shooting all over.

There are still, as we speak, shootouts between

security forces and terrorists.

Reporter: It is an apocalyptic scene

as you're driving here to the south...

Reporter: And around different border communities

Hamas is in control totally.

Reporter: There's some areas in Israel

that emergency services can't make it.

Ambulances can't make it.

The IDF can't make it there.

Amir Tibon: At that point, I realized

nobody's gonna come. So...

I called my father.

(waves crashing on shore)

Noam Tibon: I don't know why, we woke up very early.

And instead of, you know,

trying to get sleep again,

we said, let's go, have a walk,

have, have a nice swim, you know,

ordinary day,

beautiful day in Tel Aviv.

Around 6, we're swimming

and 6:30 when we are in the middle of the sea,

we, we hear the sirens.

(distant sirens)

But, you know, Gali asked me

'Noam, what do you say?' And I said,

'We are in the middle of nowhere.'

7:15, we are back in the vehicle.

And only then, I open my cell phone,

because I usually leave it on the Jeep.

And I got the text message from Amir.

(text notification sounds)

Immediately, I called Amir,

because on that time you can still talk.

And I gave him this very, very, clear-

It's not an order, but what to do.

Lock everything.

Be in the safe room.

Lock the door from the inside.

Be quiet. I'm sending the military. That's it.

Because, in a way,

you know, I need to trust the IDF

that they will do their job.

I was there for 35 years.

Journalist: Retired General Noam Tibon.

Reporter: Noam Tibon.

Reporter: Noam Tibon is a big deal,

Retired Major General.

Reporter: The former Commander of the Northern formation

for the Israel Defense Forces,

overlooking Israel's border with Lebanon.

¶¶

Noam Tibon: But something in my gut feeling told me, no.

Go, go, go!

So I follow my heart.

This is an instinct of a father.

¶ (dramatic music) ¶

Of a grandfather.

My family is under danger.

I'm here.

And basically from that on,

we're on the mission.

Gali Mir-Tobon: It took us, like, minutes

to arrive from from the beach

to our home.

And then it took him, like,

a few minutes, and he was ready, ready to go.

And then I said, 'No, give me a few minutes.'

I want to join you, because you need your hands

for the phone to ask for rescue from the military,

and also for the gun.

Producer: Did he try to talk you out of going with him?

Gali Mir-Tobon: No. He knew it would not help.

And also he understood that it's true.

Maybe he'll need to use his pistol,

and he surely needs to talk on the phone.

Noam Tibon: When I arrived at home,

I was so focused on

change quick and, and

hit the road.

But, you know, when Gali told me,

'Let me come with you.'

(finger snap)

Yes, it is smart.

We, we can do it better together.

And since that moment,

we worked like a team.

I trust her 100%.

Everything.

Gali Mir-Tobon: We are always a team.

We are an A-team.

We are together since we are 15 years old.

We are high school sweethearts.

And in the family,

we call him '911',

because whatever you need,

like you have something wrong with the car,

okay, you call Dad, of course.

If you need support,

somebody you can trust,

somebody you can always call,

he always puts the family in priority.

It just the habit.

The kids took that name for him, '911'.

And I think it is still today.

Noam Tibon: (slow sigh)

I was afraid

to think about

what would happen if I will come

and they are not alive.

And if there is something which went

again and again in my mind,

I didn't talk about it with Gali yes,

how can I continue my life

if they are not alive?

I was willing to do everything

in order to save my family.

(ticking stopwatch)

¶ (dramatic music) ¶

¶¶

Around 7:30 in the morning,

we are on our way to

Nahal Oz in our Jeep.

Basically what I felt

that I'm, I'm on a mission.

And I'm going to use all my experience,

all my knowledge,

all my values

to save my family.

As simple as this.

Gali Mir-Tobon: We listened to the news on the radio

and people report

and I start to understand

it is very, very dangerous.

It's not a squad of terrorists

in Nahal Oz only,

it is all over the place.

The more we hear, the more we understand,

the more we are determined

to rescue our family.

¶¶¶

(ticking stopwatch)

Noam Tibon: It's around 8 o'clock in the morning,

when we come to Ashkelon.

And basically from Ashkelon

we are the only vehicle on the road.

It was unbelievable.

The only vehicle on the road.

Gali Mir-Tobon: Noam and I were, you know,

very focused on the mission.

But, yes, from time to time,

I would tell my husband

there is something terrible about this quiet.

I mean, I hope

I thought that there will be

a lot of Jeeps driving,

a lot of armor vehicles, and none of it.

The roads were empty.

It was strange.

Noam Tibon: Time is...

is the most important thing.

Gali is speeding.

She is 140, 160.

And I'm trying to call everyone who I know

from the military.

All my contacts.

Nobody responds.

We are alone in the world.

This is what I felt.

Go into the unknown.

- There is still a lot of uncertainty

going on down south.

- The worst part about it is that

we don't actually know

really what's going on.

- They injured the people.

And as far as I'm talking to you now,

we didn't get any message about them

beating the kibbutz.

- Slaughter in multiple Israeli towns as we speak.

- They took over our villages and communities

and the army was not ready.

- I can say that I have never seen

this amount of dead bodies in one day.

- They're used to mass-casualty events,

but not to this magnitude.

- The head of Hamas military wing, Mohammed Deif,

announcing it is the beginning of a war.

¶ (low booming ominous music) ¶

Nukhba soldiers from Hamas

got directly into the Amir's neighborhood,

and the first battle was between

Ilan Fiorentino.

And Ilan was in charge of

the security in kibbutz Nahal Oz.

He's my son neighbor.

And this brave guy went out,

and the whole battle was on my son porch.

We have camera videos from the Hamas,

on my son porch.

(gunfire/shouting)

One wall distance between

the terrorist

and my family, which is my whole life.

¶¶

Sharon Fiorentino: Ilan was born in kibbutz Nahal Oz.

He dedicated his whole life,

contributing to the community of Nahal Oz.

It was his like...

goal in life to give back to the community

that helped his family when he was younger.

Presenter: ...Ilan Fiorentino.

(cheering/applause)

Sharon: So he decided to become the security

officer of the kibbutz.

Amir Tibon: He was the most optimistic person I ever met.

And we would see each other almost every morning,

'cause we would take our girls

about the same time, to kindergarten.

And all I needed to see

in order to feel good, was his smile.

'Cause, you know, he's the security chief

of the community. He's responsible for

all of our communications with the army

and the security situation.

So if I saw him smile and wave and say good morning,

I knew things were under control.

Sharon Fiorentino: It was really early in the morning,

when we hear all the alarms.

And then he got a phone call from someone from the kibbutz,

a mother telling him that her son

went for a morning jog and he's afraid.

Amir Tibon: And she told him,

Ilan, listen,

my boy is out there jogging.

He's caught in this

crazy barrage of mortars.

Can you please save him?

And he went out, while the mortars

were falling on the kibbutz.

And he found him and he rescued him.

And then he took him to his house,

'cause it was closer than the other family's home.

Sharon: The boy was exactly where the terrorists came,

the yellow gate. It was like minutes after that,

all the terrorists came from the same exact place

that the boy was.

And they came running.

He screamed to one of the neighbors,

'Go inside fast to your family because, they're here!'

And that's it. He left.

It was his job. They wouldn't ask me.

It was like, it goes without saying

that he has to go, if something happens.

So he didn't even say anything. He just left.

¶ (low ominous music) ¶

Beri Meirovich: I started to make some phones

to understand what happening.

And I talked to,

I tried to talk to Ilan,

the Head of the Security

in the kibbutz.

He didn't answered.

And then I called to Nissan.

He was the second guy in the security.

Nissan Dekalo: Beri called me and said,

'if I need help?' So I told him that...

Ilan is probably dead.

And I need help because I'm all alone.

Beri: I said to him, 'Come pick me up from my home.'

I give a hug for my wife, and...

and I went.

Nissan: I picked him up to the armored car,

and from there we started

fighting for hours without backup.

Sharon Fiorentino: I called him, um,

like in 7 and 9 minutes.

I told him that I locked the house,

because he left without locking.

He told me that he's in the middle of a battle.

Producer: He told you that,

while he was on the phone with you?

Yes.

(shouting in Arabic)

Amir Tibon: It was clear that the military wasn't there.

One minute passes and another and

you hear the gunfire, you hear the shouting.

The military is clearly not in the kibbutz.

Miri Tibon: And we still were able

to see a bit in the kibbutz chat groups,

that, um-

that we're not the only house

who's been attacked.

And that there's no military presence

all over the kibbutz, basically.

(gun fire)

I read a script that he had

like, they would exercise all the time,

what would happen if there were

terrorists in the kibbutz?

So...

if- they believe that

in eight minutes, the army would come.

So the whole scenario took eight minutes.

Beri: I didn't know,

um, what's happening.

So we are keep on patrolling in the kibbutz,

and we saw that all the kibbutz is with terrorists.

All over we have terrorists.

(shouting in Arabic)

They come more and more and more.

Hundreds...hundreds.

Shooting at us. When we are...

driving with the car.

we hear the bullets...

on the car.

And few seconds after,

we get RPG on our car,

(loud explosion)

and we are not in control.

Amir Tibon: I learned Arabic in my military service,

so I understood some of what they were saying.

We had one field commander standing

right outside our window,

shouting orders to his men,

(shouting in Arabic)

how to get into the house.

(cutting/ripping)

(breaking sounds)

¶ (loud techno dance music) ¶

Journalist: As dawn broke

at the Supernova Music Festival,

only about three miles from the Israel-Gaza border,

video taken by a festival goer appears to show

objects approaching from the sky.

They later find out they were Hamas paragliders.

The celebration became a hunting ground for Hamas.

Many took cover in bathrooms,

bomb shelters, ditches.

Most of them ended up dead.

(indistinct shouting)

(gunshot)

(ticking stopwatch)

Noam Tibon: 8:30 in the morning,

the road is completely empty.

We are the only vehicle on the road,

and we are driving very fast

and suddenly we meet the war.

Journalist: Video shows hundreds of people

abandoning the party

as gunshots ring out around them.

(indistinct shouting)

Witnesses described abandoning their cars

after being shot at and running.

(indistinct shouting)

(gunshot)

Noam Tibon: Straight forward, we see a police car...

completely blocking the road and

a white pickup is coming towards them,

shooting all over.

And the bullets are coming...

to us.

One of the policemen is turning to me,

and he say, 'Go away, go away, go away!' with his hand.

We stop here at the side of the road,

and basically we talk. What can we do?

The road is blocked.

Gali: We stand there and we don't,

we are not sure what to do, but

we talk about going through the fields,

cutting through the fields,

because we know the area pretty well.

Noam: And then, from the bushes,

right in front of us,

a young couple,

coming from the bushes,

to the center of the road.

Journalist: Crowds of people racing across dusty fields,

trying to find safety.

More videos showing people hiding from attackers

in the bushes nearby.

Noam: They were hiding right here.

They lie between the bushes.

They cover themselves with leaves.

And then they come to the road.

They heard the shooting

and they saw our vehicle.

When they escaped from the Nova festival,

with their car,

they came to Sderot Junction.

In Sderot Junction,

a terrorist shoot inside the car!

(gunfire)

Gali: Young people the age of my son,

my daughter-in-law,

and they said, 'Please help us, help us.'

And they're half-dressed,

you know, like people dressed for a party.

And they are barefoot.

They're very scared.

Noam: So I opened my, my, my door

and I shout to them,

'Come on, come on, come on!'

They are running to us.

They enter the Jeep.

We give them water.

Gali: We didn't talk about it.

We just knew that that's the right thing to do.

We didn't need to talk between us,

'What? We don't go through the fields. We don't-'

No, we didn't talk about it.

It became part of the mission

because there was no way

we are going to abandon them.

Noam: So immediately I told Gali,

'Let's do a U-turn.'

And now we are driving against the traffic.

But we are the only vehicle on the road

going back about 20, 25 minutes,

all the way back to Ashkelon.

¶¶

We tell them, 'Call your family,

we'll put you in a safer place.'

And we put them, um,

in the north of Ashkelon

in the junction, where there is a police car.

And her brother came to take them.

Noam: But then Amir

text me again.

And basically he said,

'I think that there is

a terrorist inside the house.'

This is what Amir texted me.

After about an hour,

the electricity failed in kibbutz Nahal Oz.

So WhatsApp didn't work.

And of course,

usually when you are afraid,

from something big,

from the unknown,

you are frozen.

But you have to be sure

that you take the right action

and the fears are not driving you.

The action is driving you.

And right now, nobody in the world can stop me.

I need to save them.

Grandpa and Grandma.

This is our mission.

We understood that this is what we need to do.

We decided

to take another road

because we thought that that road is blocked.

So we took the 232 road,

in order to bypass

Sderot from east,

because we were not sure

what's going on in this region.

Gali: And we drive there and there is a checkpoint

to secure, not to let people go through,

And Noam going with his card

of retired general, to talk them,

to let us go through.

And they don't let us

and you can't go through there.

Noam: And I said, 'Listen,

I'm retired General Noam Tibon,

there is a terrorist in my son house in Kibbutz Nahal Oz,

please let me go.'

And they said, 'No way. It's a war zone.

Nobody can enter.'

Gali: I tried to convince them,

I'm less polite,

I'm crying, I'm yelling.

My son and my daughter-in-law

and our two granddaughters are in Nahal Oz.

We have to get there.

Or please, send troops to Nahal Oz.

Can you send troops to Nahal Oz?

And we understand that they don't understand

what we are talking about.

They never heard before we came,

that there is trouble in Nahal Oz.

Journalist: Israel's military had inadequate forces

in the area, and did not have a clear picture

of the events until hours after the attack began.

- We have planes, we have helicopters,

we have tanks, we have everything.

For the first couple of hours,

it's like we have no army.

- But the words of survivors,

'Where was the army?'

Reporter: Where was the army?

- Soldiers didn't arrive for about eight hours.

By then, hundreds were dead,

missing or kidnapped.

Noam: And you know, this,

it changed my attitude because,

we were almost two hours in the region,

we didn't see even one soldier.

Nobody is answering me from the military.

And then, you know, I said, okay,

enough is enough.

Enough is enough!

Gali: So we go back to the car,

and decide to go through the fields,

and that's what we do.

We do a bypass through the fields.

Noam: They're pointing their guns to us.

And we rushed through. We didn't stop.

Gali: And I opened the windows and said,

'I'm going to my son.

You can shoot me if you want.'

Noam: So now, we're entering an area

that was occupied

by Hamas.

I understood that we can get into an ambush,

and it going to be very difficult

with only one pistol.

But you have to take risk,

and this is what we did.

(ticking stopwatch)

¶ (low ominous music) ¶

Noam: Around 10 o'clock in the morning,

we are arriving to Sderot Junction.

Gali: It's also called the Arch Junction,

the big yellow arches.

Okay. (sighs)

Noam: And now, we are in a different story.

I served many years in the military,

35 years in the military.

So I saw bodies in my lifetime.

I saw many bodies,

but I never, ever saw something like this.

Gali: On the road,

full of cars, all upside down.

Burned cars.

And bodies, it's full of bodies.

You could see a couple in a car - dead,

a woman... lying dead on the road,

a family.

You see, it's, it's ours, you understand?

Noam: Right here.

And we are alone on the road.

Gali is maneuvering between bodies.

And I understood that this is big.

This is much bigger than I thought.

I put the phone aside,

and now I'm focusing only on one thing,

the pistol, to be ready.

Because I was afraid from ambushes along the road.

Gali: We turned back, we went outside to the arches,

and now we stand there, and Noam said,

'Gali, do you understand how dangerous it is?'

Noam: And I'm telling Gali, 'Listen, I never saw

something like this in my lifetime.

This is much bigger than I thought.

It is very, very dangerous.'

Gali: And I say, 'You know, Noam,

what if instead of us,

another couple would have stand here?'

'They stand here. They know that

some kilometers, 10 kilometers from here,

they know that their son, their daughter-in-law,

their two granddaughters, are under severe danger.

What would you tell them?

Go home?

Trust the military?

Wait for the police?'

And Noam doesn't answer,

because it becomes a rhetorical question.

We understand each other.

Noam: At that moment, we are decided that we are going.

And yes, I understood,

this is going to be a battle from here,

all the way to Nahal Oz,

because the whole region

were occupied by Hamas.

There were no State of Israel.

We were alone

on our journey

to save our family.

¶¶

Amir Tibon: You know, we had one phone that we could use

to try to communicate, and another

in order to try to light the room.

And both of them were running out of battery pretty fast.

So...it was a very slow day,

but you appreciate every minute

because you hope that

the military is on its way,

that backup is coming.

And you say, well, if I survived,

a minute, 10 minutes, an hour...

surely someone will get here.

Miri Tibon: The cell reception was very bad,

but every once in a while

it was just text message after text message,

after text message of

complete helplessness.

People crying out for help,

asking if the military is there,

people hearing terrorists enter their homes...

(speaking Arabic)

(speaking Arabic)

Amir: In every home, there's this safe room.

It's a room built of thick concrete,

that is supposed to withstand even direct hits

by mortars and rockets.

And you can shelter inside that room

at times of emergency.

And even if a rocket directly falls on your house,

as long as you close the door of that room

and cover the window with some kind of metal plate

that is installed in it,

you will be safe.

But we have no idea even what's inside our house.

We had friends in the kibbutz,

who had injured terrorists inside their living room

in complete silence for hours,

waiting for the family to make one small mistake.

Some one to go to the bathroom.

Some one to go get water and then kill them.

And we thought something similar

could be going on in our house.

That the fact that it's quiet

on the other side of the wall of the safe room,

which is where the living room is,

doesn't mean there's nobody there.

(rifle shot)

(shouting in Arabic)

(shouting in Arabic)

Sharon Fiorentino: Without electricity

it was very dark, no water, nothing.

We had nothing.

The minute there were no, there was no electricity,

people that didn't close the blinds on time,

the, you know, the whole house was open.

(rifle fire)

(rifle fire)

Sharon: I thought it was a matter of time

that they would get inside and that's it.

I didn't even know how to lock the door of the safety room.

Nissan Dekalo: You have to understand that

all the people in the kibbutz

were sitting in shelters,

in safe rooms,

and holding the handles,

because if-

the Arabs could open the handles from the outside.

- (shouting) Open the door!

(rifle fire)

Nissan: And they were holding for hours,

they were holding the handles,

not let them in, because

once they got in, they slaughtered them,

or took them to Gaza.

Miri Tibon: The door was closed

and the window was closed for so many hours.

There is no AC,

no power, no light.

It was, was hard day.

And we just felt that

we're running out of air,

even just to open the door

to get some air.

Amir Tibon: For me, it was the light.

When you have closed the door,

and you've covered the window,

there's no crack.

There is no place for the light to come in.

(loud gun shot)

Miri: The shooting was so heavy,

the glass, the bullets

flying all over our living room,

banging with hammers

on our front door,

several grenades...

(explosion)

I mean, with all this noise,

this chaos that we've heard,

I was sure that they were able

to get inside the house,

and that they're just waiting for us outside.

Amir: Hope always exists,

but we had to come to terms with the situation,

and we said our farewells.

To each other, to our families.

We realized that maybe it's important to say goodbye,

because if you don't do it at the right moment,

you may not have the moment to do it later.

(message notification sound)

Noam Tibon: It's now about 11 in the morning.

We are going...south,

entering Mefalsim,

which, it's all short distance.

In Mafalsim, there is a huge battle

between Israeli troops... and Hamas

on the gate of the kibbutz.

(shouting/multiple gun fire)

Gali: And there is the first time we see a military unit.

This is the largest force we have seen,

and I think there were 20 or so.

Noam: I stopped here because it was fire all over.

You cannot cross.

There was shooting across,

across the main road.

We stopped the car near that shelter,

and Gali and I jumped into the shelter.

We were hiding there for a while,

and then the soldier said,

'It's not good that you are alone.'

They took us to that shelter, right here.

But the shelter was full of bodies

of poor people from the Nova Festival

who tried to escape,

and the terrorists threw grenades into the shelter.

(loud explosion)

¶ (low mournful music) ¶

Noam: The battle here ended,

and then...

after a while,

my dream came through.

Gali: Three armored Jeeps arrive.

It's the best unit of Israel

to take care of terror actions.

And as they arrived, you know, we go,

and we are so happy they arrived,

and we ask for help for Nahal Oz.

We say, Noam can go with you and he can show you

where the houses that the terrorists are in.

And he knows the kibbutz and-

And the soldiers, the, the fighters,

they really want to go with him.

But their commander, he said, 'No, wait,

I need to get permission

from headquarters.'

What he doesn't know

that there is no headquarter anymore.

Noam: First of all, cellular network is not working.

Number two, the whole chain of command,

it's all collapse, nobody to talk to.

And he's trying and trying,

and time is moving

and I'm begging.

And I'm not a begging guy.

Nothing works.

Gali: The time is nearly 12.

Suppose those fighters,

the best of Israel,

would listen to us.

Suppose they would go with their Jeeps?

What if.

But they don't.

A single fighter,

Avi, he said,

'Oh, I know Noam! He was the commander of the

Nahal brigade or something.

I don't know from where,

and I'll go with him.'

Noam: This guy was already wounded in the leg

from the battle in Sderot.

But he was the first one on that day

who was willing to help me.

And I ask for help from many soldiers and policemen.

The first one!

The commander, said, 'No, no, you are part of the team.

You stay here.' And he said, 'No, it's war time.

I'm going to help Noam.'

And then, we said,

'Okay, Gali, you will stay here

in the shelter,

and we are going to Nahal Oz.'

Gali: It was so fast, everything.

Avi said, 'You're staying here.'

And I said, 'Of course, Avi, I'm staying here.'

I just want to know your name, because I'll never forget it.

Noam: And Gali, my brave wife says,

'Don't worry' to me, 'I will be okay. I'm okay.

But promise me, you'll go to Nahal Oz,

to rescue our family.'

Gali: It's okay. I'm staying in the shelter

and not far from me, like 200 meters,

are more soldiers, I'm not afraid about that.

But before they leave, I go to the other Jeeps

and I said, 'Only one is going to Nahal Oz?'

I say, 'Only one?'

How can they succeed,

if it's only one?

(ticking stopwatch)

Amir Tibon: Around noon, my mom wrote me

that they are close to Nahal Oz,

and that my father is now on the move toward us.

Producer: How do you feel?

Amir: A little hope, but at the same time, concern,

because it's a very dangerous...way.

(shouting in Arabic)

Miri Tibon: My hope was that

if we remain silent,

then perhaps they'll think

that no one is inside,

and maybe, just maybe, they'll go elsewhere.

And so, my thought was,

how do I buy us more time,

by keeping the girls quiet?

(shouting in Arabic)

Amir Tibon: In the beginning, Miri told them

it's important to stay quiet,

because there are dangerous noises outside,

and it worked for a long time.

But at some point you also have to give them

something to look forward to.

And after that message from my mom, I felt

that this was the one card we could play.

And we told them, 'Girls, if you stay quiet,

Saba will come here. He's on his way to Nahal Oz,

and if we stay quiet in the room, all of us,

he will come to our house.'

And it was also something we told to ourselves.

We knew, he would get over anything it takes,

to get to us.

Noam: Now I'm driving with a pistol.

Avi is sitting next to me,

he is full armed, but wounded,

and we are alone.

Nobody is coming.

And then suddenly,

a military vehicle

coming from that road,

from Netivot.

And I stopped them here,

and I said, 'What is your mission?'

It's about six officers

from the paratroopers

basic training.

And I ask them, 'What is your mission?'

And they said, 'Nahal Oz.'

Now they don't know me,

I don't know them.

And I said, 'Okay, come with me.'

They were not aware that I'm a retired general,

but they said, 'Let's, let's go together.'

(clock ticking)

Noam: I'm driving here very slowly,

and I'm very focused on the road,

afraid from ambushes.

This is what I see. Okay?

What you see right now is this is what I see.

(shouting in Arabic)

(loud explosion)

Noam: But what I'm coming to here,

I see an Israeli from a Golan unit, Jeep,

just where the flags are.

It's full of holes of bullets.

On the right hand side, I see

five Israeli soldiers lying.

Here, they fell into an ambush.

And this is when I came.

We immediately, we moved and we stop right there,

and Avi and myself are entering the battle.

So what I see here, on the left hand side,

I see about 7 or 8 Hamas

Nukhba soldiers, terrorists attacking.

And on the right hand side,

I see five soldiers lying there.

I don't know if they are dead or alive.

The terrorist has RPGs and Kalashnikovs,

they were well armed.

The paratroopers,

they parked on the road

and they're coming with us.

But from, from that minute, I'm alone.

¶¶¶ (shouting)

I'm lying here. I'm shooting one bullet,

with the pistol

and its useless, because we are under

very, very heavy fire.

The terrorists are there.

The vehicle is, is right here.

And I'm lying here near the wheel,

like this.

The soldiers on my left hand side, telling me something.

It's very noisy because we are under

very, very heavy fire.

And I think they want magazine.

So I'm looking to my right hand side.

I see three soldiers lying right here.

I grab each one of the three to me,

Hen Buchris,

Yiftah Yavetz,

and Afik Rosenthal.

I checked them,

all three of them are dead.

I took his rifle,

and then I understand that I'm fighting for my life.

(heavy gunfire/shouting)

I see two terrorists trying to come to here,

right from here. I shot the first one.

(shouting)

He's about 15, 20 meters from here.

I killed him. I see that he's lying dead.

And then the other one jumped.

I hit him in the shoulder.

And then, the other brave soldier killed

the rest of the 7 or 8 terrorist.

And it become quiet.

This... terrorist...

mission was to block the road to Nahal Oz.

While their friends are killing and slaughtering

the people in Nahal Oz,

they, their mission was to prevent anyone

to come and help the kibbutz.

And by killing them,

we opened the road to Nahal Oz.

And this is my dream to, to run to my, to my vehicle,

take the soldiers with me,

and go to Nahal Oz.

But then I hear from somewhere here

somebody is shouting, 'I'm wounded, I'm wounded.'

I go to him, I turn him upside down,

he's an Israeli officer

and he got the bullet in his belly.

And he is bleeding, bleeding, bleeding.

You know, we have what we call

in the military 'the golden hour'.

If somebody is bleeding,

you have to take him to the hospital,

you have one hour.

You will not do it, he is going to die.

And this was my biggest dilemma

on all that day, because

my heart wanted to go to Nahal Oz,

to rescue my family.

It's behind the corner.

But this guy,

was fighting with me

and I understood that if I would not evacuate,

he may be going to die.

And I'm not leaving any wounded soldiers behind me.

I don't know them. But still, we were a team.

We were a squad, and we were fighting

to save each other and to kill the terrorists.

That's why I felt I cannot leave them here to die.

I had a plan in my head.

So I'm telling them,

let's put them on my Jeep.

Nahal Oz is so close,

I don't have connection with Amir.

I know that the kibbutz is full of terrorists,

but I did, you know, a fast turn.

And now I'm speeding as much as I can

with the wounded guys, to Mefalsim.

Gali: I'm in the shelter.

I stand inside. I understand it's very dangerous

because you hear bombs,

you hear the shooting.

It's not a closed shelter.

It's, it's on the road.

And then suddenly, I hear somebody say,

'Is there anybody here? Anybody here?'

Noam: While Gali was here alone,

a very good friend of mine, Israel Ziv,

who was my commander in the IDF,

came to the junction,

again with a pistol,

he's a retired general, to help people.

He went first.

There's a shelter on the other side of the road,

and it was full of bodies.

And then he's coming to this side,

with his pistol, he said, 'Anyone here?'

Gali: So I go a bit out,

and I see somebody,

and he's wearing uniforms.

So I start all over,

'You know, you need to send help to Nahal Oz.'

He said, 'I'm sorry, I'm just a volunteer here.'

I- 'So who are you?'

He said, 'I'm Israel Ziv.'

Oh, general retired, Israel Ziv!

Israel, it's Gali!

Noam: While she's starting to tell him my story,

I'm coming back through here,

with my Jeep with all the wounded.

I'm parking right here,

and I'm shouting, 'Gali, Gali!'

Gali: Noam comes back with the Jeep.

He, he wears a helmet,

and he has a gun, not a pistol.

I mean, I didn't know where he got it from.

I didn't have time to ask him.

He was um, stained with blood, so I understood.

I didn't know if it's his blood, somebody else's blood.

I didn't know anything. The Jeep was with blood.

He yells at me,

'Gali, we need to evacuate wounded soldiers.'

Noam: But she's fully relax.

And I said, 'Gali, take them to the hospital in Ashkelon.

And Gali said, 'No problem, I will do it.

But you go with Israel.'

And she's pointed... a white car,

standing here nearby.

Gali: But I didn't have time to ask questions,

what's going on? Because, it was more important

for me to tell Noam that Israel Ziv is here,

and there is a Jeep to go back to Nahal Oz,

as I take the wounded with me in our Jeep.

Noam: We are talking about Brotherhood,

here in the middle of the battle,

I'm coming to the Israel car,

I opened the door and I said,

'Israel, please take me to Nahal Oz.'

And Israel, with no hesitation,

says two words - 'Jump on!'

You know, we used to work a lot in Lebanon.

In the old days.

He's driving...

like crazy.

The window is open.

My rifle is outside.

We are ready for the battle,

and we are going back

all the way to Nahal Oz, together.

Gali: And I, I enter the Jeep,

I sit behind the wheel,

and there is a soldier

severely wounded in the back.

And this soldier asked me,

'How long will it take you

to get to the Barzilai Hospital?' in,

it's in Ashkelon.

And I say, 'Listen, everything will be fine.

It'll take me like 20, 25 minutes.'

And he said, 'I don't think I can make it.'

So I know I have two more soldiers to take,

and they're outside yelling,

that they go back to the battle.

They don't go to the hospital.

I used to be a teacher and a school principal,

so I go out and I use my teacher's voice.

And I said, 'You get into the Jeep now!'

I have a wounded soldier, I have to move.

And it works, because they are so young,

the soldiers, they're kids.

They get into the Jeep and we drive.

And as we drive, we see on the road junction, an ambulance.

So instead of driving left to Ashkelon,

we drive right and straight

to the ambulance and we all yell.

'We have a wounded soldier!

It's a belly wound, it's severe! You have to-'

And they come, and they take him.

And I believe that it saved his life,

because I'm not sure we could make it

on time to Ashkelon.

And we all follow him to the hospital.

(ticking stopwatch)

¶¶

(speaking in Arabic)

(gun shot/loud grunting)

Beri Meirovich: We killed a field terrorists,

and we see it, so all the time,

more and more terrorists are in the kibbutz,

shooting at us.

When we are driving with the car,

we hear the bullets.

One bullet also hit the windshield

and the driver said,

'One more bullet, it's all broken.'

From then, our car wasn't working good.

We couldn't drive as we want.

Sharon Fiorentino: I called Ilan several times.

And after that I send him a message and it was sent.

But he didn't read it.

And a few minutes after that,

you can see that

it didn't arrive, the message.

Producer: What do you instantly think

when he's not responding to you?

Sharon: That he's busy. I wouldn't call him usually

when he's, I know that he's busy.

I try to understand if I hear his voice from the outside,

because at some point I started to hear...Hebrew.

And I was trying to understand if I hear him,

I sent Ilan a voice message,

telling him, 'I hope you're okay, and you're not dead.'

Beri: It's hot.

The car, the air condition didn't work.

We are keep on going, as much as we can,

but we were dehydrated. All of us.

And...

we try to talk to the army

and walkie talkie that we have over there.

Producer: Anybody respond?

Beri: No.

¶ (ominous music) ¶

Noam: This is Kibbutz Nahal Oz on the left hand side.

And on the right hand side,

there is the Nahal Oz post.

We lost here more soldiers

than any other point on October 7th.

52 soldiers.

¶¶ (ticking stopwatch)

Noam: We see the military post is burning

with a very dark,

dark smoke go into the sky.

I look at the gate,

and I see that it's locked and it's quiet,

so I don't know exactly what is the situation.

Israel and myself start to think what to do.

And then a few minutes later, two forces are coming.

Sayeret Givati,

and...Maglan,

is one of the elite units in the IDF,

a commando unit,

and they understand that I'm

high rank...Israel,

when he saw the soldiers are coming, he said,

'Noam, I see that everything here is okay, bye!'

and he's moving, and I'm here with the soldier.

I'm trying to look at the gate

to see if something happening.

I see nothing.

We don't know where the enemy is...

(shouting/commotion)

and we are running. We don't spend time.

We feel comfortable here,

to walk from here that nobody can see us.

We watch the gate.

We see that the gate is locked.

We are worried that they have booby trap,

or something on the gate.

And then I said, 'Listen guys, I know another gate

not far away from here. Let's try to go there.'

We put few soldiers

to cover us from that side

and we start to run along the fence,

all the way to the other gate.

At the same time that we are doing it,

Maglan unit is coming from the field,

to this gate.

¶¶¶

(ticking stopwatch)

And then they came.

They came with their jeeps,

uh, a lot of jeeps,

a lot of soldiers.

I was...

it, I think it was the first time that I was breathing,

go out from the car,

to try to explain them

what's going on in the kibbutz,

to show them in the map.

And then the way it was the first time that I

saw (inaudible).

We were coming to this gate. This gate was open.

What we saw here when we enter

were vehicles of Maglan unit

and two people

from the local squad,

Barry and Nissan.

Their vehicle that got RPG

would look like, you know,

a disaster.

Everybody was very, very tired

from the local squad.

I met them,

and then the two units united.

Barry's a hero,

and basically when,

when you learn the story of Nahal Oz,

you know the small squad,

Ilan, Barry, Nissan,

and the guy from the Border Patrol,

went out,

and fight,

and saved the kibbutz of Nahal Oz,

in many ways, they slowed down

those hundreds of terrorist.

And this is what make the different.

They were fighting for

7, 8 hours until we

arrived with the first forces

of Maglan and Sayeret Givati.

And we were here,

among the trees.

And basically, the soldiers

start to do all kind of orders. And then,

I told Nissan and Beri,

let's push them, because we don't have time.

There are terrorists inside the kibbutz.

And I remember just that I start to yell over there,

'Kadima, let's get in!

They are killing all the kibbutz.'

Noam: People are slaughtering here.

There is no time.

So, let's do it.

And 1:30 p.m.,

I lead them into the kibbutz.

Amir: I think by 2 p.m., both of our phones

were not working anymore.

Miri: And so you just, you just have no clue.

We just sat there, and tried to guess, but

we had no idea what is going on.

Amir: You have no vision. You can only work with your ears.

(loud bang)

Miri: There are still missiles that are being shot,

and the shouting, and it's just like one big mess.

(shouting)

Amir: But we began to hear these exchanges of fire,

where one side sounds like a precise use of firepower.

And that's when we both looked at each other,

well, it was very dark, but

in the direction of each other and said,

sounds like the army is getting here.

Producer: Do you feel some hope?

Amir: Definitely.

Noam: They are shooting all over.

And here, the unit split.

Sayeret Givati go to the northern part of the kibbutz

and Maglan is going to the southern part of the kibbutz.

And now I'm in a small team of ten soldiers.

Something like this.

And we are starting to search here.

There are trees,

small houses,

and terrorist can hide everywhere,

so you have to search very carefully,

and you need to be sure that

what you search is clean.

You have no terrorist in your back.

So we are starting to work on this road.

We clean this house,

and then we go to that house,

from house to house,

and on every house,

we need to break in,

either to break the window,

or to break the door.

You get inside, you search

the whole house, all the floors.

It takes time, because you have to search everywhere,

in every corner.

When it's clean, then we knock

on the door on the safe room.

Beri: I went to the safe rooms, to the window.

I yelled to the people, 'It's Beri!'

because they didn't want to open.

I get inside in the few houses,

I saw people white.

I, I remember another house,

I looked inside and I see

that they had killed somebody,

that is more than 8 years old,

sitting on the sofa,

with a book, dead.

(pained sigh)

And then I start to understand what happened.

We told the people, the military is here.

You can go for one minute to the bathroom,

get water, get food, lock yourself,

until we will tell you that we finished the work here,

and we will evacuate you.

All the people on the safe room, really thought

that this is going to be their last minute, their last day.

It was terrible. They were waiting here

for 10 hours, shouting for help.

Nobody came.

And then we moving as fast as we can,

to clean the kibbutz, face to face

against waves of terrorists.

So I will tell you what,

it was a battle here.

¶¶

(automatic gun fire)

(gun fire)

(RPG fire)

(rifle fire)

(ticking stopwatch)

Noam: We came to this corner,

and I saw my son house.

After 10 hours, and I saw

that the door is locked.

And that gave me a lot of hope because,

every house that the door was locked,

the people inside were alive.

So, I am talking with the commander.

And basically he decided to do the right thing,

first of all, to search all those houses in this aisle

and only then to come back to my son house.

So this is what we are doing.

We go from house, to house, to house.

We search each house, and we coming to here,

and only here I am telling

the young soldiers of Maglan, I said,

'This is my son house, let me go first.'

And they said, 'okay, will cover you.'

When I'm coming to here,

basically, I see

here, lying,

the body of the brave,

Ilan Fiorentino.

This is his house.

I see here...

five terrorists lying dead,

one of them, with an armed RPG,

and I'm going, I'm very, very careful,

watching to there to be sure

that nobody is shooting at me,

coming to here, and I said...

(bang, bang)

Amir: We hear this bang on the window of the safe room.

It was weird, first of all.

And then we immediately heard my father's voice.

Noam: Amir, ze aba.

Miri: Amir, ze aba.

(speaking Hebrew)

Amir, it's Dad.

Open the door.

Noam: And then, I heard this

beautiful voice of little guy, I said,

'Sababa, grandpa is here.'

And of course this is the great moment of my lifetime,

but it was still battle all over.

So I said, 'Amir, open the front door.'

and he said, okay.

Amir: I think it just

took me a second to realize what was happening.

And then,

I still have this dilemma about opening the door,

because we were scared all the time,

that somebody was waiting on the other side of it but,

I thought about it and I said, 'okay,

this is the point where it's actually worth the risk.'

Noam: And I'm going right now, the soldiers are with me.

I'm walking here all over.

I see holes of bullets.

Mary put herself in front of the girls.

They were both on Galia's bed by that point.

She was covering them,

and I just opened the door for the first time,

and stepped outside of the room, into our living room.

(door latch clicking)

Blinding light.

And...

I was expecting to see a terrorist on the other side.

And instead, what I saw was our dog,

who refused in the morning,

to come into the safe room with us

and had not barked during the entire day,

and so we were sure that he was dead,

wagging his tail

between all those bullet marks,

just a completely surreal situation.

But I had no time

to pay attention to it, because I wanted to go

and open the door to the house,

so my father could come in.

Noam: He opened the door. I see my son

is only with underwear.

He's crying. I hug him.

I said, 'Amir, it's okay. I'm here.'

And I'm getting in,

to see the entire family,

the soldiers getting in, they search the house

to see that everything is good.

With him are, I believe, seven soldiers.

And they kind of wash over the house.

They scan it very quickly.

I saw there were blood stains on his jeans,

but...it wasn't his blood...

which was...

good to see.

And meanwhile, we're hugging each other at the entrance.

Noam: Amir is crying.

I'm going to the...safe room.

It's totally dark.

I'm getting in.

I hug Miri. She's also very emotional.

I give a kiss to Galia,

a kiss to Carmel.

And I say, 'stay in the safe room.

There is still a battle here.

Don't worry, I'm here.'

(soft sigh)

Gali: I think it was...

5 p.m.

that I got a message from my daughter-in-law.

She saw-- she sent me an SMS,

and she said, 'Noam arrived.'

We are fine. Our family is fine.

I felt...

it was the first time I could, I could breathe.

I could breathe on that day.

And I...

I said, like, you know, he did it.

Our 911 did it. (relieved laugh)

That's what I felt.

¶ (soft uplifting music) ¶

This is my whole world.

This is the most important thing in my life.

You know, my, my, my small family.

So many people lost, lost their kids

lost their parents, lost their husband.

So we are really lucky.

And...

you know, Amir wrote,

the real heroes are

my daughters, Galia and Carmel,

that were quiet all day long.

I just remember how happy

and excited they were to see Saba.

And it was just such a great joy for me,

to see their excitement.

This moment was...

really, I think,

the only good moment I think we had,

on this horrible day that they were just so,

so, so happy to see him.

Noam: The soldiers already finished

to search the house.

Blutoo is alive.

He was hiding somewhere here.

And then Amir asked them,

'are you hungry, are you thirsty?

And they-- you know, soldiers are polite, they say,

And then Amir said,

and he grabbed everything that he has in the fridge,

put it on the table.

Amir: And then this entire mountain of food

that was on the table, within 60 seconds,

it just wasn't there.

So, it was all very emotional,

but at the same time,

very practical as well.

My dad hadn't put down the gun or the helmet yet.

There was still gunfire, there were still mortars.

This wasn't over.

Noam: I'm telling the soldiers,

listen, guys, from now on,

this is your headquarters.

Build your headquarters here.

In every neighborhood, they chose one house,

and they concentrated the neighbors under one roof,

because then, it's easier to protect civilians

if there is still some terrorists

hiding in the area.

And for the next few hours, that's what happened.

They one-by-one began to bring

families into our house.

Noam: We collected all the neighbors,

to one house in this neighborhood, to this house.

Finally, people understood and can talk

and they start to understand,

who is dead and who is alive.

Sharon: And it was crazy because we sat, we sat in,

in the safety room in my house,

like for 12 hours without speaking.

When you moved to the Tibon's house, there was lights on.

There were making food,

eating like, ice cream.

There was, like 30 people in the house,

and were in the middle of the...

nothing ended!

It was weird, very weird.

I couldn't, I couldn't...

grasp the situation at all.

Miri: Has dozens of people,

the house is completely packed.

Amir: You have neighbors, you have

soldiers coming in and out.

My father is helping them organize the evacuation.

Gali: I knew that Noam will arrive in Nahal Oz,

no matter what. I knew, he will

rescue our son and daughter.

I knew he will rescue our granddaughters.

I had no doubt he will do that.

I didn't know...

that he will rescue so many people on the way.

I didn't know that when he will arrive to Nahal Oz,

he will assemble the forces coming

and tell them, no, we don't wait,

because in (inaudible) and in (inaudible)

they were full of troops, but they waited.

They didn't go into the kibbutz

and in Nahal Oz, Noam was there.

So I said, 'let's go, let's go!'

You know, and so, there was somebody taking them.

Nobody waited!

I met Beri.

And I understood that

he didn't hear from Ilan since the morning.

And then I understood that

the situation was completely different,

because all the time I thought that the Ilan was,

you know, in a battle he was fighting I don't know.

I didn't think he was dead.

But then when I understood that nobody heard from him

since the morning...

I understood how hard the...

the situation is.

Amir: After he had gone out to fight the terrorists,

and did not return,

these girls,

with Sharon, their mother, they came to our house,

and they kept asking about him.

They didn't see him, and they kept

asking about him all the time.

And we tried to...

show some kind of optimism and hope,

but, we had a bad feeling.

Sharon: When we went out of my house,

there were a lot of bodies all over.

I didn't know that Ilan's body was also,

he was shot in our back porch.

Beri: Ilan was one of the most

popular persons in Nahal Oz.

Wonderful person,

wonderful...father.

He left a family with three children.

He was the first outside,

fighting against the terrorists,

and they killed him.

I miss him, when I talk about him.

¶ (low dramatic music) ¶

¶¶

Noam: Those guys are so brave.

They were fighting for hours,

alone, against those waves of terrorist.

And I can tell you this,

without those brave people,

the whole picture would be different here.

You have to remember,

Yakov Kosinski from the Border Patrol,

and Ilan Fiorentino, both were killed in a battle

on two side of my son house.

I owe everything

to those brave people.

Everything.

Sharon: For years, Ilan was a security officer.

I knew that he would have been.

I would tell them all the time,

because every time there was um...

mini war, you could say, I practiced at being,

practiced at being a widow, like every time.

So I knew it would happen.

I would tell it to him all the time,

that he would leave me with three girls.

But I knew that this is what he wants to do,

that's his job in life.

And I think...

you know, at least he...

he left the world that way.

¶ (soft mournful music) ¶

Amir: And then they say, okay,

we're about to bring in Jeeps,

and one-by-one we're going to

load the people on those jeeps and then take them toward

Tractor depot, from which

a bus will come and take everybody else

out of the kibbutz.

Miri: Since our house was the headquarters,

I was sort of worried

and tried to make sure

that other people are okay,

that the children, they were okay.

Some of the children that were inside our house,

did not know where their fathers or families were.

They were asking all sort of difficult questions.

And I was trying answer the best I could.

Gali: And then around 11 p.m.,

Noam called me and said they arrived

in a military base near the kibbutz,

they were all evacuated.

400 people that my husband helped to evacuate.

So I drove back to,

to that military base,

and that's the first time I met my husband.

I met my son,

my daughter, my granddaughters.

We hug, we cry, we don't talk.

We have nothing to say.

We cry.

I cry.

And...

we all go in the Jeep home.

¶ (soft low music) ¶

Noam: If there is something which I'm so proud,

so proud of that day,

that everybody who I met,

on my journey to save my

my small family here in this room,

everybody who I met,

the people from the nova festival,

the wounded soldiers.

and all the community of Nahal Oz,

everyone who I met, we rescued their life.

I didn't leave anyone behind me.

(birds chirping)

¶ (soft mournful music) ¶

¶¶

¶¶

¶¶

Gali: Sometimes I feel it been a day since October 7th,

and sometimes I feel like it's a million years.

I would say there are ups and downs, you know.

The family is together, we are alive.

We look at other people, so we feel fortunate.

But still, I know that

both my son and my daughter-in-law

went through a terrible thing.

And um,

I'm not sure they can go back to kibbutz Nahal Oz,

or back to their life.

Noam: Almost half of the kibbutz is in

Kibbutz Mishmar HaEmek,

up north where Amir and Miri live today,

in a permanent neighborhood that they built,

for Kibbutz Nahal Oz.

About 20 people, mainly old people,

already came back, but

especially family with kids.

This is a very personal decision

because they, they went through

such a big nightmare.

Producer: Would you ever move back?

Sharon: Not right now,

because I think that my daughters

have dealt with enough and it's not responsible,

and all kinds of reasons because,

he- his memory is in every sidewalk and

everything in this kibbutz.

And I think it's too, too close to raise girls.

¶¶

This is Noam. She's 9 and-a-half.

I called her Noam, which means in Hebrew, peaceful and calm,

because I wanted her-

me to be more like her father.

So she's actually named after her father,

which was the calmest person I ever knew.

She doesn't speak about him a lot,

but I speak about him all the time.

But, but she doesn't share too much of her own...

¶ (gentle music) ¶

¶¶

Beri: This kibbutz was... a live kibbutz.

And now, there are few people.

I wish that we will be strong.

We come back home,

we rebuild the kibbutz,

and we make our life better

than it was before.

The people that are living here,

are living here with all the heart.

It's special kibbutz. It's a special place to live.

Amir: For me, the bigger question

is not Nahal Oz, it's Israel.

And, I believe Nahal Oz will recover.

But in order for Nahal Oz

to reach again the potential that it has

to be this amazing, wonderful community,

we also have to change some fundamental things

in our country.

Gali: I mean, the main phrase

that we heard on that day was,

'where is the military? Where is the military?'

And until today, there is no answer.

¶ (sombre music) ¶

It's such a feeling

that your country abandoned you.

¶¶

I think our government really wants to forget October 7th.

I understand that.

We were humiliated on that day

and that's why the war,

has an aspect of revenge,

which I think is not doing good to Israel.

Israel was established

to rescue the Jews.

To guard the Jews,

And maybe it's time to rethink

our way as a country,

because, we fail.

We failed tremendously on that day,

on the mission that this state was about,

this country is about.

If we don't protect the Jews,

we are really off the mission of our country.

Noam: The reason that Gali and I

are going to live here, in my son house

right now, is to help the community.

I want to set the example, my personal example,

to the Israeli society

and to the people of Nahal Oz,

that we can come back.

But, it is very important

that we will bring back home,

all the hostages.

Those communities

will come home,

open-minded,

only when the hostages will be back home.

¶¶

Amir: So we're now...

recording this film, this interview,

and it will be...

promoted and shown worldwide.

And we really hope that by the time

people are watching this,

there will be no more hostages in Gaza.

But you know, for half-a-year I thought the same.

We will bring them back in a deal,

and they will be alive and they will be with us.

And that just didn't happen.

And this is the biggest fear we have,

that they will be forgotten.

Noam: This is very, very emotional to me,

when I see those picture

(inaudible),

they are from Kibbutz Nahal Oz,

they are my son neighbor.

I always feel that it can be my son

in the hand of the Hamas,

and that's why it is burning in my heart,

that this is the most important issue

to bring them back home.

And only when we will bring them home,

live people, and all the dead from Gaza,

then we can start to rebuild this whole...

beautiful area.

Amir: There is a problem already today,

that October 7th is forgotten.

But...

I don't say, I tell.

I tell the story,

and the story...

stands stronger than all the lies,

all the attempts to

minimize or erase,

or even justify,

the atrocities of that day.

The story stands tall,

and everybody who is trying to deny it,

this is my response to them.

This is my story.

Edward R. Murrow: We end as we began,

by saying,

there is a smell of war out there,

and if it comes,

then free men everywhere

will have cause to examine their actions

and their conscience,

as to whether it might have been prevented.

Good night and good luck.

¶ (soft piano music) ¶

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