[1/2]Festival goers’ personal belongings are seen at the site of an attack on the Nova Festival by Hamas gunmen from Gaza near Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip in southern Israel on October 12, 2023. Portal/Ronen Zvulun acquire license rights
- Israel shows its allies pictures of the consequences of the Hamas attack
- Netanyahu publishes photo of dead baby and charred infant
- After a militant attack, Israel launches airstrikes on Gaza
JERUSALEM/TEL AVIV/BRUSSELS, Oct 12 (Portal) – The Israeli government showed U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and NATO defense ministers graphic images of dead children and civilians on Thursday, saying they were killed by the Palestinian group Hamas that builds support for her answer.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office also posted an image on social media of a dead infant in a pool of blood and the charred body of a child, part of an apparent attempt to stoke global anger against Gaza militants over Saturday’s attack.
Blinken, who flew to Tel Aviv on Thursday, told reporters he was shown photos and videos of a bullet-riddled baby, beheaded soldiers and young people burned alive in their cars or hiding places.
“It’s just depravity in the worst form imaginable,” Blinken said at a news conference. “Pictures say more than a thousand words. These pictures can say more than a million.”
Netanyahu has vowed to destroy Hamas after it launched a deadly attack on unsuspecting Israeli communities on Saturday that killed more than 1,300 people. This was the deadliest attack by Palestinian militants since Israel’s founding in 1948.
The Israeli air force has carried out intense bombing raids on Gaza over the past five days and is amassing tens of thousands of troops along the border ahead of a possible ground invasion.
In Israel, Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, the country’s military chief, said Thursday: “Now is the time for war.”
According to Gaza authorities, more than 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians including children, have been killed and more than 6,000 injured. A land invasion in the densely populated area could significantly increase the number of victims.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant played a video to his counterparts at NATO headquarters in Brussels that he said showed horrific scenes of Hamas’ surprise attack.
“Children were tied up and shot. Yes, I repeat, children, tied up and shot,” he told his ministerial colleagues via video link, according to a text of his speech sent to Portal.
“HORRIBLE IMAGES”
In a message on the social media site “X,” Netanyahu’s office posted “horrifying photos of babies murdered and burned by the Hamas monsters.”
It added: “Hamas is inhumane. Hamas is ISIS,” comparing the Palestinian group to the Islamic State, which was notorious for its brutality and bloody execution videos.
The images of the dead infants were included in the video played to NATO. It was not released to the public but was later viewed by Portal in Jerusalem. Portal could not independently verify the material.
“There were terrible images of the attacks and the victims of the attacks,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters, saying it confirmed “the brutality of the attacks.”
In quotes released by Hamas, Hamas deputy chief Saleh Al-Arouri said: “The plan was to target the army’s Gaza team and only fight against occupying soldiers.”
However, the White House said it had no reason to doubt the authenticity of the images. Authenticated video footage and witness statements paint a picture of a Hamas ground attack and rocket fire that tore communities apart.
The video shown to NATO, which appeared to come from a mix of social media posted by Hamas and unidentified phone videos, showed the bodies of numerous dead civilians as well as the body of an Israeli soldier in uniform who was missing his head.
There were no images to suggest that militants had beheaded babies, a particularly explosive allegation that first appeared in Israeli media and was initially confirmed by Israeli officials.
US President Joseph Biden suggested on Wednesday that he had seen images of children beheaded by militants. The White House later clarified that US officials had seen no evidence of this.
Netanyahu did not repeat his office’s claim earlier this week that Hamas had actually cut off children’s heads, and Gallant did not repeat that accusation to NATO ministers either.
But doctors, international human rights organizations and journalists have documented that militants killed women, children and the elderly, as well as young men and soldiers in their rampage.
Foreign reporters showed places attacked by Hamas, seeing ruins of burned-out houses and streets filled with dead residents and militants.
NATO officials said they did not expect the alliance to be directly involved in the conflict. But several NATO countries, especially the USA, have offered Israel military aid.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said after Thursday’s NATO meeting that Washington places no conditions on its security assistance to Israel and expects Israel’s professional military to “do the right things.”
Additional reporting by Andy Gray in Brussels; Writing by Crispian Balmer; Edited by Edmund Blair
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