Seventeen men and women died from the terrorist attack. Their bodies in their bus seats and on the floor were all around her.
New Jersey-born Sarri Singer was riding on Jerusalem city bus #14, going to meet a friend for dinner, when a terrorist disguised as a religious Jew hit the trigger that activated 22 pounds of explosives. It was 5 p.m. on June 11, 2003.
Exactly 20 years later, Singer marked the day with a meal of thanks at Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem where her life was saved. With her were seven other terror survivors whose lives had also been saved in bombings, along with Hadassah medical staff and representatives of Hadassah, The Women's Zionist Organization of America, who have provided support throughout her ordeal.
Singer explained, “I’m here to thank the staff of Hadassah Medical Organization who saved my life and the women of Hadassah who were there for me, and have been there for me, over the last two decades. Being here today is so significant to me, especially with so many of you who were also in terror attacks. There's no reason why some of those on the bus with me didn't survive and I am here. I have to think that I am here for a reason. It’s my hope that I can help prevent future terror victims by speaking out and to be the voice of Israel in the world.”
Today, Singer, director of Career Services at Touro College, supports other terrorism survivors through an organization she started called Strength to Strength.
In Jerusalem for the first time on the June 11 anniversary, she recalled hearing the explosion, closing her eyes and then silence. The concussive waves ruptured her eardrums. Sitting half way back in the bus near the window, Singer had bent over to place her cellphone in her backpack when the bomber struck.
The wave pushed her back in her seat. Singer was burned and bleeding and screaming. A passerby who had heard the explosion motioned for her to get off the bus. She said she couldn’t. With her feet on the burned out window frame, the passerby managed to squeeze her through the frame and pulled her from the bus.
An ambulance raced her to the Hadassah Ein Kerem Trauma Center where representatives of Hadassah’s Jerusalem office approached her.
“Something told us she was American and might be all alone in Israel,” said Barbara Sofer, Israel director of Public Relations for Hadassah. “The first thing she said was that she didn't want her parents to know. We told her that the bombing would soon be in the news. I asked her what her parents’ phone number was. I handed her my cellphone as she told them she’d been in a terror attack but that she was going to be okay. Then she was rolled into surgery.”
Singer had absorbed shrapnel in her neck and shoulders. Two pieces lodged in her mouth. Her clavicle was fractured. She would remain in the hospital for 12 days.
Her father, Robert W. Singer, is a longtime state senator in New Jersey and former mayor of Lakewood. His daughter’s close escape from death drew international media.
Joining Singer were the following terror survivors:
Gila Halili Weiss, a former HWZOA activist and now a CPA in Israel, was blown up in the Macheneh Yehudah market in 2002. Alone and unconscious, she was identified because a roommate remembered the color of her most recent pedicure. Today, she has her own business dealing with international taxation.
Moshe Frej, a volunteer medic, was shot in the back taking care of ambushed soldiers in Hebron in 2002. He underwent emergency, experimental surgery. He's now the father of eight and an osteopath.
Adi Huja Peretz was 14 in 2001, while she was waiting for her two cousins to finish getting ice cream near one of the terrorists in a night of a triple attack killing 10 attending a birthday party. She absorbed so much shrapnel that 120 units of blood flowed through her until an experimental drug for hemophiliacs, Nova 7, was tried by Hadassah’s Prof. Avi Rivkind. Though it was reputedly contraindicated for trauma, the bleeding slowed and stopped. Prof. Iri Liebergall, abroad at the time, returned to Israel and countermanded the plan to amputate her leg. Many operations followed, including one several months ago. She’s married and a mother of three.
Dvir Musai was not quite 13 when his class went on a field trip cherry picking at a nearby farm. He and two friends were fooling around and sent back to the bus by their teacher. Dvir stepped on a landmine planted by terrorists to kill the farmer. He has had more than 40 operations at Hadassah and works as part of the tourism team in the Hadassah Offices in Israel. He is married and the father of two.
Aluma Mekaitan Guertzenstein was 17 in 2002, when a terrorist killed himself near her on the bus on the way to school. Metal shrapnel entered her brain and body. She underwent life-saving surgery at Hadassah and years of physical therapy. She has the use of only one arm. Her pregnancy was followed at Hadassah, and after she gave birth, the brit took place there. Aluma managed to complete three degrees despite her injuries.
Dr. Gabby Elbaz Greener was studying occupational therapy in 1995 at Hadassah's school on Mount Scopus when the bus she was on was blown up. Devastatingly injured, she was treated at Mount Scopus and Ein Kerem. During the recovery period, she decided to become a physician. She is a leading interventional cardiologist on both campuses, married and the mother of three.
Natan Sandaka was a 21-year-old Border Guard patrolling on the Street of the Prophets when a passerby alerted him to a suspicious-looking man dressed in the clothing of a religious Jew and carrying a large backpack. Sandaka ran after him. The terrorist stopped and activated his device. Sandaka, gravely injured, was pulled back to life in the Intensive Care Unit at Hadassah Ein Kerem. He works for an NGO with teens at risk in a community center in Naveh Yaakov, Jerusalem.
The survivors went upstairs in the hospital to visit Daniel Turgeman, who had undergone additional surgery for his injuries from the terror attack at the Moment Café in 2002. He was not well enough to attend the luncheon.
Commenting to the assembled survivors, Dalia Itzik, chair of the Board of the Hadassah Medical Organization, said, “The hospital and its staff are an indivisible part of the city of Jerusalem in regular days and in times of terror attacks. Hadassah has long given top professional care to the residents of Jerusalem and will always be there for them in the future.”
“When I heard the stories of those who recovered from the terror attacks after treatment at Hadassah,” said Hadassah CEO Naomi Adler, “I felt overwhelming gratitude to the thousands of Hadassah supporters who make this happen.”