Yoni Asher, 37, received the last picture of his daughters last Saturday, just after nine in the morning. His wife Doron, 34, captured them playing in the safe room, at a time when they still hoped that perhaps a miracle would happen and the terrorists would skip their house.
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"My wife and the girls, four-and-a-half-year-old Raz and two-and-a-half-year-old Aviv, went to visit Doron's mother and her partner at Kibbutz Nir Oz for the celebration of Simchat Torah. I didn't go with them,” he said.
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Last photo of Raz and Aviv Asher playing in the family's safe room before their abduction into Gaza
(Photo: Courtesy of the family)
“They were there on Thursday, stayed with them, and in the end, decided to stay for an additional night. Doron was born on the kibbutz, and it was a regular family visit, like many they had in the past.”
On Saturday morning, the kibbutz residents were horrified to discover that terrorists had infiltrated their community. Although initially hopeful that the situation would resolve without issues, Doron called her husband roughly an hour later.
"She whispered to me and told me that there were terrorists inside the house," Asher recalls. "They were locked in the safe room along with my mother-in-law's partner, but she said that at one point, he decided to talk to the terrorists, and it seems like they took him along with some money, wallets, and bags that were in the house."
Asher, fearing that the terrorists would hear their voices and get to the safe room, asked his wife to hang up. "At that point, I was under the impression that the terrorists had taken the money and left," he explains. But in reality, that was their last conversation.
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Doron Asher seen huddled with her daughters in a video from the attack circulating online
After losing contact with her and receiving no response to his calls, Asher located his wife's phone at 11:30am, discovering she was in the Gaza Strip’s Khan Yunis.
He subsequently found a video on Telegram showing the terrorists loading Doron and the girls onto a cart, covering Doron's hair and taking them into Gaza. "Since then, we've had no new information about them," he says in pain.
Lior Katz Natanzon, Doron's sister, was also at their mother's on Thursday but returned to her central Israel home on Friday. On Saturday, she heard news about the terrorist attack.
"I texted Doron, told them to lock the safe room, and after that, I don't know what happened there," she recounts sorrowfully, "When the terrorists entered their home, I fell apart."
Lior refused to watch the video circulating on social media. "We are praying for their release," she says, "They are such young girls."
The family has paid an immense price. Doron and Lior's brother, a member of the kibbutz's armed emergency team, is missing, as are their abducted mother and her partner.