“Since Saturday, I haven’t slept, the situation in Israel affects me too much, there are terrible images, some remind us of the Shoah,” says Sarah, 25, whose family lives in Israel. “My cousins are in a kibbutz near Ashkelon, they are in hiding. I was so scared for them.” Her sister is in Tel Aviv. “There, she is afraid to go out into the street, especially with the rumors circulating about Hezbollah also attacking.” Four days after Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel, launched on the morning of Saturday October 7, more than 900 people were killed in Israel, and 2,616 injured, according to the authorities.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant quickly declared a state of emergency on Saturday. Later, on the night of Saturday to Sunday, Israel’s security cabinet also announced, in the presence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the formalization of the “state of war”.
This Tuesday, two other French nationals died in Israel, bringing to four the number of French victims of terrorist attacks carried out by Hamas against Israel, according to a press release from the Quai d’Orsay. Meyer Habib, LR related deputy for the 8th constituency of French people living abroad, recalled this morning that “around fifteen” French people are still missing, either “dead or in the hands of Hamas”.
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Since Saturday, “I lock myself in my room and cry,” confides David, a 57-year-old father who has lived in Tel Aviv for 8 years. This weekend, it became a “ghost town” he says, where “only essential stores” are open. The children are not returning to school at this time. “At my age, we all have children who are called up to fight, my daughter’s boyfriend left last night. I have injured relatives, others who were taken hostage,” he says, his voice trembling.
For Julia, helping in any way she could seemed “obvious”. A Parisian student, she joined her grandparents in Netanya, a northern suburb of Tel Aviv, to celebrate the Jewish holidays. Taken by surprise by the events, she volunteers in a hotel requisitioned to help soldiers. “I had come for the holidays, I never would have imagined preparing boxes of food and dressings for soldiers of my age who are going to war,” she laments. In this hotel, she realizes that “soldiers come from all over the world.” She adds: “They are my age, they are friends, cousins, brothers and sisters who are going to fight bloodthirsty terrorists, we are all worried, we are not designed to experience war.”
Since Saturday, the Israeli army has recalled 300,000 reservists to its ranks to respond to the war being waged on its territory. A figure confirmed Monday, October 9 by IDF spokesperson, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, who specified that the Hebrew State had “never recalled so many reservists on such a large scale.” Isabelle, a resident of Herzliya, a near suburb of Tel Aviv, saw her three children leave for the army. “I let my 24-year-old daughter join a military base. It was afterwards that I realized the danger. We live in a small country here, everyone knows people who have disappeared. Nothing like this has happened since the Yom Kippur War,” she says with anguish.
While several countries have made the decision to repatriate their nationals, this is not yet the case for France. Eager to bring her little sister home from Tel Aviv, Sarah tried to contact the Quai d’Orsay. “When I called, I was told that there was no crisis unit and that the situation was not alarming enough at the moment,” she explains.
Eliana’s flight was maintained, the 18-year-old girl was able to return from Israel last night, where she was visiting her father. Safe and sound, she thinks back to this rude awakening, when she had to run to the shelters on Saturday in Ashdod. “I woke up with a start because of the alarms, I was very scared, we couldn’t believe that terrorists had crossed the border.” In Paris, Eliana’s fear persists, she admits not feeling safe in France for fear of anti-Semitic acts. “I’m going to be particularly careful,” she says. A feeling shared by Sarah who did not go to the synagogue on Saturday morning, as usual. “We all know that as soon as there is a problem in Israel, it is reflected in France,” she concludes.