A 13-year-old Israeli girl recounted how she and her family survived a devastating Hamas attack on their border community by huddling in their safe room for 16 hours as rampaging terrorists butchered their friends and neighbors.
Renana Botzer Swissa also revealed that the prospect of seeing Taylor Swift’s “Eras” tour concert next June kept her spirits up while in hiding — and gave her hope that she would make it out alive.
Renana told CBS News’ Nora O’Donnell in an interview that aired on “CBS Mornings” Thursday how she woke up at 6:22 a.m. Saturday at her home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza to the sound of alarms going off, which she said caused her to have a panic attack.
Living just a few miles from the Gaza border, the Swissa family, like others in their community of 800 people, had a safe room in their house, and that is where Renana, her parents and grandmother ran to shelter in place.
For the next 16 hours, the family remained in their hiding place and prayed while Hamas terrorists destroyed nearby homes and massacred entire families, including women, babies and toddlers.
The Israeli military has said that some infants were found beheaded and burned beyond recognition in Kfar Aza, as seen in ghastly photos released Thursday by the Office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Sitting in the safe room, Renana said, she had some idea what could happen if the terrorists were to breach the door.
“I thought if they were gonna come into my house, into my bedroom, I didn’t know what they were gonna do. Are they gonna rape me? Are they gonna kidnap me? Are they gonna kill me?” the teen recalled.
But she said her mom kept her calm by encouraging her to think about her tickets to Taylor Swift’s concert scheduled for June 2024, which she said gave her hope “that I’m going to make it to June, that I’m going to make it out alive.”
That night, the family finally heard the voices of Israeli soldiers coming to rescue them.
Renana said when she emerged from the safe room, she did not recognize her surroundings.
“The smell when we got out, it was just the smell of the war,” she said.
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As the 13-year-old walked to a bus that would carry her and her family to safety, she said she was “so scared,” but a family friend urged her not to cry and “run.”
Renana’s mother, Ilanit, told CBS News through tears that she had lost “too many” loved ones in the bloodbath, among them her “best friends.”
Ilanit also revealed that her teenage daughter made her a promise while they hid for their lives.
“She told me, ‘If we’re going to make it together, I will let you kiss me anytime you want,’” the mom said. “Because I’m always kissing her and she’s always saying, ‘Stop, Mom. Stop, Mom.’ Since then, I’m kissing her every minute.”
It is still unclear how many people died in Kfar Aza, but Maj. Gen. Itai Veruv, with the Israeli Defense Forces, likened the depravity of the killings in the kibbutz to scenes from the Holocaust.
“I have heard during my childhood about the pogroms in Europe, the Holocaust, of course,” Veruv told CNN. “All my family came from Europe, they are survivors. But I never thought I would see … things like that.”
More than 1,200 people have been killed in Israel, including 25 Americans, and at least 2,800 others have been injured, the Israeli military said Thursday. At least 1,354 people have been killed in Gaza as a result of Israel’s retaliatory strikes, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.