Life has been turned upside down for survivors of the Hamas massacre. One such person is a nurse, Zohara Koval, whose home in kibbutz Nahal Oz was targeted by Hamas. She and the other survivors were evacuated to the north of the country, preventing her from reporting for duty. However, Koval remains determined to save lives, for now, at Rambam Health Care Campus (Rambam) in Haifa, Israel.
Zohara Koval at Rambam. Photography: Rambam HCC
Anyone hearing Zohara Koval’s story understands that she is a woman of persistence and resilience. In Israel, the gruesome events of October 7, 2023 are now referred to as “Black Sabbath.” During the attack, she, her husband and four children, remained in their protected room for 17 hours, their lives in grave danger, but determined to survive.
Koval recalls sitting with her family in the protected area of their home without electricity or cell reception. Remembering the horrors of that day, she says “The whole time we could hear them surrounding our house. We were just waiting for them to come and kill us.”
At 11:00 PM that night, Koval and her family were rescued and taken to the Mishmar HaNegev military base, and from there to Kibbutz Mishmar HaEmek in the western Jezreel Valley with the remaining kibbutz community. After three weeks of living as an evacuee and onlooker of ongoing events, this dedicated nurse made a decision that exemplifies the strength and force of life.
Before she was displaced, Koval had worked tirelessly, day in and day out, treating one patient after another in the emergency room of Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon. Now that she and her family have been temporarily relocated nearly 180 kilometers north of home, Koval insists on not letting terror win. She now continues her work in Rambam’s Green Wagner Department of Emergency Medicine.
“I felt that I needed to do something”, Koval explains. “It is hard for me to sit idly by and dwell in our atmosphere of bereavement. I needed to get out.” For more than a month now, Koval has been reporting for duty in the emergency department at Rambam. “We received a professional and amazing nurse with superior abilities,” says Mrs. Gila Hyams, Rambam’s Director of Nursing. “We thank her for the opportunity to be part of her process of returning to some kind of routine.”
Although Koval is immersed in her work at Rambam, her heart remains in the South with her colleagues and the hospital she knows so well. “I am in constant contact with them. I know what they went through and fully support them,” she says.
Koval has a clear vision for the future, which includes returning to Kibbutz Nahal Oz. “We are coming back, and in a big way. Although we still cannot visit the house, the cowshed is back up and running. We have planted wheat and picked the avocados. There is progress.”
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