Haim Perry and his wife have been living for 60 years in the idyllic ‘kibbutz’ Nir Oz, a community of 350 inhabitants located very close to the Gaza Strip, within a spectacular botanical garden with more than 900 varieties of trees, plants and flowers. Last Saturday, Nir Oz woke up very different.
“Dozens of terrorists invaded the ‘kibbutz’ and They began to carry out a massacre against the residents, house by house,” says Noam Perry, Harry’s daughter. “They killed my friends, people I grew up with. There is not a single family on the kibbutz that came out unscathed. Everyone I know has at least one family member kidnapped or brutally murdered.. The survivors will need a long time to recover. The houses have been burned…”, describes Noam, 40, before the international media.
Of the 350 members of his ‘kibbutz’, more than 20 were killed and 80 are missing, probably kidnapped. Of them, 24 are elderly people, over 75 years old, many with health problems. Fifteen are children and there are even babies.
Among the hostages is Noam’s own father: “He is almost 80 years old. He is a loving husband, wonderful father of five children and grandfather of 13 grandchildren. He heard the terrorists enter the house and was able to contain them, giving my mother a few precious minutes to hide. They took my father, but my mother is with us. “She remained hidden for hours after he was taken away, fearing for his life.”
Despair takes over with the passing of the days of the families of those among 100 and 150 Israeli civilians kidnapped by Hamas during the brutal attack last Saturday and taken to Gaza. Among the captives there are also foreigners or citizens with dual nationality. “We don’t know anything about their condition, whether they are alive. “It has been four long days and nights without sleep for all the families,” says Noam, who asks for help from international NGOs working in Gaza to “contact the kidnapped and be able to make sure that they are alive and that they have what they need.” to survive”.