‘They turned off the electricity and suddenly out of nowhere they come inside with gunfire’
On Saturday morning news emerged that Hamas, the pro-Palestinian militant group, had entered Israel with an attack which was seemingly completely unprecedented in size and planning.
What began with hundreds of missiles being fired from Gaza into Israel at 6.30am local time Saturday morning sparked the beginning of the attack.
Hamas were able to overpower Israel’s Iron Dome missile detection system by firing too many missiles into Israel for the system to respond to.
Other reports claim that members of Hamas, armed with machine guns, paraglided across the border. Hundreds more entered via holes cut through the border barriers.
There were dozens of co-ordinated attacks in different places, one of which took place at the Supernova Festival, a music festival being held in the desert to coincide with the Jewish festival of Sukhot.
The festival was described on social media as: “The time has come when the whole family is about to get together again. And what fun it is going to be!”
Shortly afterwards that same social media page was full of messages and pleas from families and friends searching for loved ones.
More than 260 bodies have since been recovered from the festival site, reports the BBC.
One festival goer said that the first sign something was wrong was when a siren went off at around dawn warning of rockets.
Moments later, there were gunshots.
One woman called Ortel told Israel’s Channel 12: “They turned off the electricity and suddenly out of nowhere they [militants] come inside with gunfire, opening fire in every direction.
“Fifty terrorists arrived in vans, dressed in military uniforms.”
Ortel added that people were running across the sand to try and get out of the festival site, but that there were dozens of gunmen shooting at them.
She explained: “They fired bursts, and we reached a point where everyone stopped their vehicles and started running. I went into a tree, a bush like this, and they just started spraying people. I saw masses of wounded people thrown around and I’m in a tree and trying to understand what’s going on.”
At the time of writing, the death toll in Israel stands at around 1,100 according to reports.
