A bereaved mum who called to check on her daughter during the October 7 massacre heard a Hamas militant's voice when the phone was answered.
Michal, 52, who only gave her first name, is the mother of Amit Lahav, a 23-year-old who was slaughtered along with her two friends during the group's bloody raid last year. Amit, one of Michal and her husband's three children, was at the Nova music festival when attacked, and went missing for five days following the horror killings that set off the latest stage of Israel's long war.
The mum told the that she was "terrified and desperately worried" while waiting for work from her daughter, and hoped she had been "kidnapped and not killed" as casualties were counted and identified. She said: "She was missing for five days and I was terrified and desperately worried."
"I almost hoped she had been kidnapped and not killed but then we heard the truth. At 7.30 she called us and said she could not get out, or that they were not allowed out of where she and we were unsure what was happening." The mum called her daughter back, and received a chilling answer when someone else picked up her daughter's phone.
She said: "When I called her back an Arab voice answered the phone - and he just laughed. I was sure she had been kidnapped but not this. She has brothers, one of whom is 21 and he is a soldier. I cannot say where he is at the moment. This is such a terribly sad day, we are all struggling with it but we wanted to be here."
In a post on less than a month after the bloody attacks, the mum posted a lengthy tribute to her daughter remembering the moment she picked up the phone fearing for her safety and expecting to hear her voice, saying: "Who ever thought it could be something else."
She told of her anger and fear as she remembered the 23-year-old, but also how "purposeful" and "beautiful" she was. She wrote: "Lahav celebrated her 23rd birthday two weeks before the bloody Shabbat, this week she was supposed to start studying computer science, she was so excited.
"She has always been purposeful, optimistic, smiling, comforting, a rolling laugh, beautiful on the outside but more beautiful on the inside. Forever going to stay 23. God bless you." Amit's family members aren't her only loved-ones remembering the free spirited traveller, who enjoyed travelling the , having visited Central America to hike volcanoes, swam with sharks, and ziplined in rainforests. Friends have shared dozens of videos showing her adventures, which included moments of her dancing on tables.
