“Do you know what happened to my father and mother?” Thirteen-year-old Gila Beibas, of Beisan, asked that question of a visitor in the orthopedic ward at Afuleh Central Hospital today after describing her escape from her parents’ flat, broken into by three bullet-spewing terrorists before dawn yesterday. Gila, her brothers, Asher, nearly 16 and Shlomo. 14. jumped from the second floor terrace in panic to save their lives. She fell. injuring both legs.
The last glimpse she had of her parents, Yehuda and Zohara Beibas, was of them lying face-down on the floor in a pool of blood. She didn’t know that both were fatally wounded by the first burst of automatic fire from the terrorists’ Kalachnikof assault rifles.
The dark-haired, dark-eyed girl said she had awakened and was washing her hands in the lavatory when she heard gunfire and explosions, Before she could dry her hands her brothers were pushing her to the terrace. “Jump if you want to live,” Asher told her. “I saw father and mother on the floor with blood covering them. I hesitated but my brothers kept saying. ‘jump,’ and I went over the veranda, I held on for a minute but my hands were wet and I fell. My brothers jumped after me. They hailed a car and we were taken to the police station,” she said. She paused and then asked again, “Do you know what happened to father and mother?”
HARROWING STORIES OF ESCAPE
Gila’s brothers, in another hospital ward, were also unaware that their parents were dead, victims of the latest terrorist outrage that took four lives and caused injuries to more than 20 persons in the immigrant township of Beisan, four miles west of the Jordanian border. The boys said they saw their parents on the floor and presumed they were trying to escape the hail of bullets. “If we didn’t jump we thought we would die.” Asher said.
The three Beibas children were also spared the knowledge, for the time being, that their father’s body was mistaken for that of a slain terrorist by infuriated townspeople who invaded the flat after it was assaulted by Israeli soldiers; that it was hurled from the terrace and burned along with the terrorists’ corpses by an outraged mob. Yehuda Beibas was identified only after his mutilated remains were examined at the police mortuary.
There were other harrowing stories of escape. One mother made a rope of sheets and blankets and lowered her three small children to safety as the terrorists rampaged through the four-story building firing into doors and throwing grenades. She herself tried to climb down but became entangled in clotheslines and hung there until rescued by police. A pregnant woman also made a rope of bedsheets and lowered herself; but the rope was too short and she fell. Neighbors took her to a hospital where she was reported to have gone into labor.
The horrors at Beisan shocked all of Israel. There were long lines outside blood banks today as citizens and tourists donated blood for the wounded. Several hundred delegates attending the B’nai B’rith triennial international convention donated blood at a Red Mogen David mobile unit brought to the convention hall in Tel Aviv. About 40 pints were flown to Beisan. B’nai B’rith District 3, which covers New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware donated $3000 to the Red Mogen David today.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
