The Gaza war begins in Ashkelon, 30 kilometers from the strip. Near this city is the first checkpoint on the road coming from Tel Aviv and from that point the presence of military vehicles intensifies. No one can approach the border without authorization. It’s a war zone. The residents of all the towns surrounding the strip remain evacuated and do not know when they will return to their homes.
In a Government bus escorted by the military and along with fifty international journalists, we headed to the Netiv Haasara moshav, the closest town to the border with Gaza – barely 300 meters – and one of the first to suffer the attack on October 7. Hamas terrorist attack, which cost the lives of 1,200 people and culminated in the transfer of 240 hostages to Gaza.
Before arriving, after leaving behind a solar panel plant, we pass through muddy fields converted into field barracks, ammunition depots and concrete walls for soldiers to take refuge in case rockets arrive from the other side, something that happens to despite the fact that Israel claims to control much of northern Gaza.
We are in the rear. From the entrance to the moshav – a community of agricultural origin that differs from the kibbutz because the property is not collective, but private – a large mushroom of smoke can be seen on the horizon and Israel’s bombing of Gaza can be heard with a continuous cadence. Bursts of distant gunshots from automatic weapons are also heard and a large white tactical balloon is stopped over the border line.
After receiving the corresponding safety advice, the journalistic delegation walks through the empty streets accompanied by two residents who came expressly to tell the press what happened that terrifying morning. One of them, Benny Vainer, carries an assault rifle and explains that that day he was not afraid for himself, but for his three children, and that he concentrated on confronting the Hamas fighters with the intention of taking them away from his family. “My biggest concern was that if I died, the terrorists wouldn’t find my family, who was in the shelter,” he says.
892 people lived in the moshav, about 300 families. It was half past six in the morning when the community security guard saw six paramotors flying over the wall that separates it from Gaza and was able to raise the alarm. Alert that also served to warn nearby kibbutz. In total, 40 Hamas members arrived in Netiv Haasara, the six who arrived by air and the rest in cars and motorcycles. With automatic weapons, grenades and rocket launchers they killed 17 residents.
Vainer and his family were saved, as was Hila Fenlon, the other resident who is with us. “We are lucky,” says Fenlon before criticizing the Government. “The political leaders of my country are responsible for my safety and they failed; They have to resign,” she says. “I educate my children in peace, so that they love everyone and are happy; “They play PlayStation, I don’t want them to see my rifle,” adds Vainer, with a tone of resignation.
Unexpectedly, the military leader of the visit shouts a dry order: “Everyone on the ground, everyone on the ground!” And we journalists lie on the ground, crowding together next to the low wall of a flower bed or in any corner of the street, with our hands on our heads, holding the back of the helmet, as they have explained to us before. Bulletproof vests make sudden contact with the asphalt somewhat more comfortable. Ten, fifteen, twenty endless seconds. Several explosions are heard above our heads. The Iron Dome – the Iron Dome, the Israeli anti-missile system – has worked. The danger has passed.
The group stops at a completely destroyed house. Burned. It was made of wood and only the metal structure remains. The terrorists attacked it with a rocket and murdered the Inon couple. Bilha, 75 years old, and Yakovi, 78. Both progressive, pacifist and very supportive of the Palestinians. His son, Maoz Inon, 48, is also a peace activist and has become popular in Israel because more than a week ago he set up a tent in front of Parliament in Jerusalem. Despite the violent death of his parents, Maoz asks to end the war.
Bilha was an artist and several of her ceramic works have survived in the burned garden, her particular museum. Intact, some ceramic chickens observe the reporters next to some dead trees but still loaded with burnt grapefruits.
