“An all-night’ nature party’ filled with thousands of dancing, singing young Israelis near Kibbutz Re’em turned into a horrific killing field Saturday morning when dozens of Hamas terrorists hunted them down: killing dozens, wounding scores, and kidnapping others into the nearby Gaza Strip.
Raziel Tamir, one of the survivors of the attack, said in a harrowing interview on Sunday morning on Kan Bet, “I don’t believe I’m alive; I don’t know if I’m alive, or if this is the way the dead feel.”
Tamir, who went to the party with four other friends, none of whom have returned, said that he was awoken in his tent at about 6:00 a.m. to the sound of gunshots, screams, explosions, and the smell of smoke.
“When I went outside my tent, I saw a crazy number of bodies, and terrorists running and firing everywhere, throwing grenades and stun grenades at people,” he said. “People tried to run to their cars, but the terrorists waited and slaughtered them as they tried to get into their cars and escape.” He said that rockets were shot at those trying to flee.
Tamir said he saw more than 50 terrorists inside the area where the party had taken place and even more who surrounded the area. He said that the amount of weaponry they used “to kill unarmed civilians is not a situation people are supposed to deal with when they go to a party and just want to celebrate life.”
Tamir said he and a friend ran in a zig-zag fashion to get out of the way of the terrorists’ fire, “jumping over bodies of security guards and soldiers.”
"We saw them falling before our eyes"
He said there were a number of soldiers lying dead on the ground, their weapons, helmets, and vests taken from them. In some instances, he said, the terrorists dressed up as IDF soldiers, and some of the partygoers ran toward them, thinking they were running toward safety, only to be fired upon.
Tamir and many others ran into a nearby orchard, looking for shelter behind the trees and bushes. The terrorists waited there, and that is where most people were kidnapped, and many were killed, he said.
“I ran into the orchard, and the first thing we saw was many injured people and bodies of soldiers, women, and young people.” Tamir said he witnessed two of his friends being kidnapped violently, beaten, and shot in the legs so they could not resist or escape.
Tamir, a friend and a woman they saw also hiding in the bushes, sought a way out of the orchard but could not find one. The terrorists were firing everywhere and set fire to part of the orchard.
“We lay on the ground under the bushes, covered ourselves with dirt and leaves so our skin and clothes would not be seen. The terrorists were firing on the ground and into the trees because they knew people were hiding there. It is a miracle we got out of there without a scratch,”he said. Some people nearby were wounded and screaming from the pain.
Tamir said it was impossible to describe what went through his mind. “I didn’t stop praying. I thought about my friends and what happened to them, if they succeeded in escaping. I thought about my other friends at the party and about the people in the nearby communities.”
At a certain point, the IDF arrived and engaged in heavy gunfire with the terrorists. He said that between lulls in the burst of fire, he and the two people he was with ran toward the soldiers and hid behind a tank that was hit. They waited with the soldiers for another couple of hours until IDF reinforcements arrived to begin a rescue operation.
“We were about 100 civilians lying on the ground,” he said. “The soldiers protected us with their bodies, and we saw them falling [from Hamas gunfire] before our eyes.”