Kibbutz ‘butchered’ by Hamas militants as IDF retrieves decapitated bodies

Hamas militants carried out a “massacre” in Kfar Azza during their attacks over the weekend, in which women, children, toddlers and elderly were “brutally butchered in an ISIS way of action,” the Israel Defense Forces has said.

A bloodbath took place in the 750-person kibbutz community of Kfar Azza, where life was torn apart in a massacre of residents, young and old, by the Hamas militia.

In its daring incursion on Israeli soil, the Islamic resistance movement that controls the Israeli-besieged Gaza strip, militants tore into the kibbutz on Saturday. Only 12 hours later, until the Israeli army assembled its troops to reach the kibbutz, was the scale of the massacre revealed.

"It's not a battlefield. It's a massacre."
Here, MG Itai Veruv is preparing journalists to enter Kfar Aza where atrocities have taken place at the hands of Hamas terrorists. pic.twitter.com/1MXMxuWHpA

— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) October 11, 2023

The IDF said it cannot confirm the number of people killed there and would not go into details how the people were killed. Houses in Kfar Azza were ransacked and set ablaze. Overturned mattresses, destroyed furniture, broken trinkets and unexploded grenades lay strewn across the grounds, along with dead bodies.

“Thank God we saved many lives of many parents and children,” said Davidi Ben Zion, the deputy commander of Unit 71, an experienced team of paratroopers who led the assault. “Unfortunately, some were burned by Molotov [cocktails]. They are very aggressive, like animals.”

Hamas militants used motorcycles and paragliders to storm into the kibbutz after they broke through the border wire. Residents with military experience who patrolled the kibbutz perimeter were killed fighting the attackers.

Residents of Kfar Aza, and the other Israeli communities along the Gaza wire, were part of a tight-knit community who lived in the shadow of the threat from Hamas rockets. Many houses had concrete shelters or safe rooms.

But the massacre is unprecedented in that nobody expected Hamas was capable of breaching Israel’s defences.

IDF soldiers on Tuesday spent much of the day in the ruins recovering bodies of civilians said that there had been a massacre. Ben Zion said Hamas gunmen had killed families, including babies, and dubbed them “a jihad machine”.

Earlier, Ben Zion alleged that some of the victims had been decapitated. This was untrue, Anadalou Agency confirmed. “They killed them and cut some of their heads, it’s a dreadful thing to see… and we must remember who is the enemy, and what our mission is, [for] justice where there is a right side and all the world needs to be behind us,” Ben Zion claimed.

#BREAKING Israeli army tells Anadolu that they have no information confirming allegations that ‘Hamas beheaded babies’ pic.twitter.com/fQJA7ui9bE

— Anadolu English (@anadoluagency) October 10, 2023

The Kfar Aza massacre now adds to the war crimes evidence Israel is lobbing at the Hamas gunmen.

In Gaza, hundreds of civilians are also being killed. During the last hours, Hamas naval targets, including the Khan Yunis and Gaza docks, which the IDF says are used by Hamas to carry out terror attacks on the Israeli coastline, were struck with artillery fire from missile boats, IDF helicopters and ground artillery batteries.

The IDF on Telegram also said Israeli Naval forces had killed a Hamas diver who attempted to infiltrate into Israel from the Gaza shores earlier today. “The IDF will continue to operate in all arenas in order to ensure the safety of Israeli civilians.”

Overnight, IDF fighter jets struck over 80 targets in Beit Hanoun in the Gaza Strip, including two banks, an underground tunnel and two operational command centres used by Hamas.

The IDF said it had also struck two Hamas “terror compounds” used for training and storing weapons, and an Islamic Jihad weapons storage facility which it claimed was located inside a mosque.