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Inside Israel's Emergency Call Center on Oct. 7

(Israel Hayom) Noam Barkan - The calls to the Magen David Adom emergency call center came in a deluge on Oct. 7. Desperate, pleading, screaming, chilling. They poured in from open fields, groves and farms, from locked closets and safe rooms, from shelters, from bullet-riddled vehicles, from injured first-responder teams, from military bases, from bushes, from ditches, under relentless gunfire, deep within the flames. They also came from parents frantic with worry, from children orphaned in an instant, from a mother during her abduction, from people fleeing death until it finally caught up with them. MDA data shows that on Oct. 7, 315 emergency medical technicians and paramedics answered 26,627 emergency calls, saving many lives. These calls represent an enormous repository of real-time documentation of the atrocities. On that Saturday morning, moment by moment, the calls become more difficult and frightening. "We all received unusual calls," says dispatcher Yael Hadad. "I looked to my right and left, we looked each other in the eyes and understood that we were all receiving calls that were beyond comprehension." Jarring sounds of screams, pain, gunfire, explosions, panic. Whispers, final gasps, silences, and shouts in Arabic are heard in some of the calls. At 7:32 a.m., the MDA dispatcher Avi answers a call. A young woman says, "They're shooting at us. We're near Gaza. There are many wounded here. Send lots of ambulances....They're shooting at us all the time!" Her terrified words mingle with the gunfire and screams in Arabic. "Ahhh," a flash of surprised pain is heard on the phone. "Ahhh." Her quick, frightened, sobbing breaths turn into three final gasps, followed by one weak one, and then silence. At least this young woman wasn't completely alone. There was someone who accompanied her until her last breath.
2024-07-09 00:00:00
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