Church group recounts trip to Israel cut short by attacks

DYER, Tenn. — Members of a local church gathered Sunday evening to recount their recent trip to Israel this past week.

Some members of First Baptist Church in Gibson County went on a pilgrimage tour in Israel earlier this month, but their trip was cut short due to the violence in Israel.

“Our tour guide told us that there had been an attack, and he kinda down[played] and was like ‘it’s not that big of a deal though, things like this happen a lot.’ Well then it kept escalating, and then we knew that they had declared war, and [we] had to stay put at the Dead Sea for a couple of nights,” said Kacie Agee.

Their trip was supposed to be 10 days long, but it was cut short to seven days.

“When we left the Dead Sea, we didn’t have hotels anymore, so had to go stay in Jerusalem,” said Rachel Self. “We were a little nervous about that, because we knew there was a little more action going on in Jerusalem. We did hear one siren while we were there, but nothing came of it, I think it was an hour from us.”

They were able to make it back to the airport just by a day due to the early closure of the border.

“That border had been closed that day, and it closed the day before, and it closed after we went through as well, just a few hours later, so really we were really lucky to get out,” Self said.

They also share that they were rushed to shelter due to a bomb siren.

“We had to run down a flight of stairs, people were screaming at us to get to shelter, and then when we got down to the bomb shelter, we weren’t all at the same area,” Agee said. “And then we had the melt down of where was everybody, and then we figured out everybody was safe and the bomb or the missile that went off hit a mosque in the surrounding area.”

Aside from this experience, members of the group agree it was worth taking and being able to see the biblical spots.

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