'I hoped I would die from a rocket': Festival survivor recounts the moment Hamas attacked in Israel

ITV News Correspondent John Ray speaks to one of the survivors of the attack on the music festival in southern Israel


In the video she shows us, she is smiling and dancing - a young woman among many young people. It’s not long after dawn. For some around her, it will be their last.

"I can’t believe we got out of there," says Millet Ben-Haim. "There are tonnes of people still missing."

Of the party-goers, more than 260 are known to have died.

In the next images she recorded - just two minutes later - the music has stopped. There are air raid sirens and missiles in the sky.


Footage captured the moment that people spotted rockets in the sky


This was the moment Hamas militants attacked the festival held close to the border with Gaza.

"I think in their worst nightmares nobody could imagine this scenario. This kind of brutality and evil and of course we didn’t think that this could happen to us."

Millet and her friends ran to their car but soon realised there was no escape.

"We didn’t know where to go and we kept hearing the shooting.


'I was just hoping I would die from a rocket because I didn’t want to see the terrorists'


"We didn’t know how close they are and of course the rockets are all the time in the sky.

"Then we started running towards the fields and I don’t know it was like two hours of running because every direction we ran to we heard more shooting and other people screaming to go the other way.

"I saw a lot of people falling down and I don’t know if they got shot or just fell down or what, I didn’t have time to look and it’s all a blur but I just saw tonnes of people falling down."

Eventually, she, and three friends, sheltered in a hollow beneath a tree. The shooting continued. She was convinced they would all die.

She sent a message to her family.

"I told them that I loved them and that I’m happy with the life that I had. 

"At that point, I was just hoping I would die from a rocket because I just really didn’t want to see the terrorists."

After five hours, she – and her companions – were rescued.

The ease with which the border was overrun, the failure of Israeli intelligence to see the attack coming.

Both have badly shaken Israeli faith in its security services. Rarely have they felt this vulnerable.


'I saw a lot of people falling down'


I ask Millet if she wants revenge.

No, I want peace, she says.

"I want people to come back safe. I want this to never happen again. I want to make sure that this kind of action is something that our world will never allow to happen."

 But instead, there will be more blood spilt. On both sides of this conflict.


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