I am a lookout who served at Nahal Oz. The only lookout soldier who survived the hell inside of the Migunit (concrete doorless shelter). It is important for me to clarify a few things, to explain what happened and to preserve the memory of my friends who were abandoned and murdered.
At 6:30 am I woke in a panic to the boom sounds and leapt into the Migunit, barefoot and still in my pajamas. All of the girls were in the Migunit and we waited alone, under a never-ending attack. The shelling was strong and the shrapnel flew inside.
No one communicated with us. We tried to contact the Operations Room, but the only thing we were told was that there was an invasion that was going to happen in our base but they were handling it, everything was ok and there was nothing to do.
"They threw three grenades and I shouted, “Girls, there is a grenade!”. I blocked my ears and started to run back to our quarters."
We waited there, some of us already called our parents to say goodbye because the booms were so strong that the Migunit was not secure and there was a hole in the roof. At 7:00 am, we heard people speaking Arabic, they got closer and started shooting bursts of fire at us inside the Migunit.
They threw three grenades and I shouted, “Girls, there is a grenade!”. I blocked my ears and started to run back to our quarters. At that point, two grenades exploded on me and I thought my leg had been blown off, but I continued on and got a bullet in my hand. I continued running and managed to get out of the Migunit, running on one leg, straight to one of the rooms of the quarters.
Me and another five girls who were not connected to the lookouts, closed ourselves into the room and laid down on the floor. At that point, Hamas was in control of the living quarters. They tried to get into the room, but for some reason, once they realized it was locked they left and didn’t try to get in again.
70 terrorists infiltrated the dormitories and we could hear them outside the room. They were speaking as if the place was theirs. We had a window in our room that had completely shattered from the shelling (a window that at any given moment the terrorists could turn their heads slightly and catch sight of us).
"We passed the Migunit on our way out and saw the horror, the bodies of my friends."
For 7 hours, during which I was bleeding non-stop, we waited in complete silence for someone to rescue us. A paratrooper patrol squad rescued us from there. We passed the Migunit on our way out and saw the horror, the bodies of my friends. The place that was once called the Nahal Oz IDF post has been destroyed to the core, a genuine battlefield.
I will conclude by saying thank you so much to each and every one of the paratroopers who took part in saving my life and that of the five other girls who were hiding in the room with me. There is not a single day that I don’t thank you, you are heroes.
And I will continue by saying that what happened there was lawlessness. Regularly, on Fridays and Saturdays there are almost no soldiers on the base. What happened was just another regular day where the enemy was underestimated and not enough soldiers were left to defend the IDF post and us.
I will also add that there were many preliminary signs that we the lookout soldiers alerted everyone to, but they did not attach any importance to them.
May their memory be blessed.
Yael R.