The triggers come when I am least expecting it; the noise of a car, the bang of a door, someone speaking Arabic. And at night I think about my friends who were killed. And I start to shake. I am here, I am speaking because I want the world to know the names of my friends: Shaked Habani, Gili Hadar, Nir Forti, Roya Manzuri, Avraham.

Kfir with (centre) Shaked Habani

They were not people of violence or hatred, they were people of pure, pure love. They were angels who had their lives ended by violent animals. In my darkest moments, when I am wondering why I am still here, I remind myself I am here to say their names. I am shaking as I speak to you but I am reminding myself that the words are for them: we are one nation.

I went to Nova with a very large group of around 60 people who had been travelling around South America. When we heard the rockets, it took some time to meet my friends and decide what to do. There was already a lot of traffic when we got to the car but then two police officers ran towards me yelling, “there are a lot of terrorists around here so you need to run away right now”.

At first a few of us got in the car while Gili and Avraham decided to go and hide somewhere else. But we weren’t moving. At one point we thought about heading towards a bridge. We would go on to discover that that’s where the terrorists were congregating.

The bullets began whizzing past us and so we got out of the car and ran. I ran 17 kilometres so fast it felt as my feet didn’t touch the ground. I could hear shooting and rockets all around me but I didn’t stop or look back. Some of the people around me stopped to hide in ditches.

God was with me, I am sure of it. He stopped me focusing on bad things. Human panic was all around me, but God let me see the sun, the field I was in and helped me carry on.

People were crying, “where is the IDF?” but I knew they would do everything for me if they could. They didn’t abandon us; they were being killed. Young girls in their pyjamas were being slaughtered.

At one point, as I ran, a friend in a car shouted at me to get in. There were ten people in the vehicle driving across a field. Someone was on the roof and I put my right leg through the window and then we drove as fast as we could until the car just stopped.

I wanted to start running again but then I saw a young man sitting in thorns in the middle of a field. His name was Roi and he was in shock, and very very scared. I told him I was a friend, that we were in the middle of a very complicated situation but that I would stay with him. And then I put him over my back and carried on walking until we got to the safe zone.

Walk to safety: Kfir with Ben and Moran, as seen in the BBC film Surviving October 7th: We Will Dance Again

When I got home, I wanted to be strong for my mother. I knew how worried she’d been. But when I saw her I screamed and said: “Mama, I am not a big boy, I am a young boy who has just been through the worst of times and I need my mother’s hug”. It was only when she hugged me that I felt safe. I told my family some of what happened but after that I tried to not talk about it with them. I didn’t want them worrying about what had happened, I didn’t want them going through what I am going through now. I don’t want my mother to have the nightmares I have.

When they saw the BBC documentary Surviving October 7th: We Will Dance Again (now available on iplayer), it was the first time they fully knew my story. I get through my days only with the other Nova survivors. We talk, we cry, we are making a show together because we are a people who love music.

My grandmother was a Holocaust survivor who came from Budapest. People try and kill us in every generation because we are Jewish. They are jealous of our belief and our friendship. That is why we have to stay strong and united. How can the world be struggling to work out who is good and bad in this conflict when the line is so clear.

Something died in me on October 7. What keeps me alive is talking about my friends who died. I don’t have much to live for but I am living for them. I am grateful that I am breathing. I am breathing.
As told to Nicole Lampert