Survivors of a tragic stampede at a Jewish festival in northern Israel on Friday recounted their horror and panic as they were crushed and trapped along with the dead bodies, gasping for breath and waiting for help, according to media reports.

The joyous Jewish religious festival of Lag B'Omer turned into a huge tragedy after at least 44 people, including children, were killed in the stampede.

The mass gathering, attended by over 100,000 people, was organised on Thursday to celebrate the annual religious holiday marked with all-night bonfires, prayer and dancing, at Mount Meron.

The town is the site of the tomb of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, a second-century sage, and is considered to be one of the holiest sites in the Jewish world.

The stampede was caused after some revellers slipped on steps, causing dozens more people to fall over, according to police sources.

It was the first major public gathering allowed since the start of the coronavirus pandemic and an event commemorating the end of another plague, some 2,000 years ago, The Times of Israel reported.

The Magen David Adom rescue service said its paramedics evacuated 100 people, including, 18 in a serious condition, 2 who were moderately hurt, and 80 lightly injured, the report said.

Panic and fear engulfed the survivors as many were trapped next to the dead, struggling to breath and waiting for rescue.

Footage from the walkway showed shoes, hats, baby strollers, smashed eyeglasses and water bottles strewn on the ground. Metal railings were torn from the ground.

“We were going in to see the bonfire lighting, and suddenly there was a wave coming out. Our bodies were swept along by themselves. People were thrown up in the air, others were crushed on the ground,” David, a survivor, was quoted as saying in the report.

"There was a kid there who kept pinching my leg, fighting for his life. We waited to be rescued for 15-20 minutes in this crazy, terrible crush. it was awful, David said.

Meir, who was injured, said, a policeman pulled me out. He protected me and made sure I would not be trampled on until I was evacuated.

It felt like an eternity, the dead were all around us, he was quoted as saying in the report.

“People lost the colour in their faces. I was under the bleachers, I tried to go up toward all the chaos when I heard banging above, thud, thud, and people shouting ‘escape, escape, people are dying’,” a survivor identified as Zohar was quoted as saying in the report.

People fell from above and crushed each other, they squashed each other. people just fell, I will never forget the banging sounds, people flying all over, he said.

Eli Beer, head of the Hatzalah rescue services organisation told Army Radio that there were a number of children among the victims.

“To my sorrow, we found small children who had been crushed, we tried to resuscitate them and managed in a few cases to save them,” he said.

An eyewitness said that people began slipping on the stairs and falling on each other.

"We were at the entrance, we decided we wanted to get out and then the police blocked the gate, so whoever wanted to get out could not get out. In that hurry we fell on each other, I thought I was going to die," an eyewitness was quoted as saying by the Jerusalem Post.

Shlomo Katz, another survivor, said that they were standing and waiting for their friends to go inside for the dancing and stuff and suddenly saw paramedics running by.

"This is one of the worst tragedies that I have ever experienced. I have not seen anything like this since I entered into the field of emergency medicine back in 2000," Vice President of the Volunteer Department of United Hatzalah Lazar Hyman was quoted as saying in the report.

"There were screams, a mess. Each one tried to get out from the other, but they didn't succeed in getting anyone out because it was a puzzle. I saw people, children, under me," the Jerusalem Post reported an eyewitness as saying.

According to the Post, followers of Jewish mysticism traditionally hold a yearly pilgrimage to Mt. Meron on the holiday of Lag B'Omer in order to honor the teachings of the father of Jewish mysticism, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai.

There is a tradition among Hassidic Jews to cut their sons' hair for the first time at Mt. Meron, when the child is three years old, and this meaningful occasion is marked with candy, songs, and dancing.

The bonfires that the followers of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai light are representative of the spiritual light that can be found within the mystical teachings of the Torah, and they are now an intrinsic part of Lag B'Omer celebrations across the world, but particularly on Mt. Meron.