A chilling video shows the moment an Israeli mother and her two young sons are dragged screaming from their home near the Gaza border by Hamas terrorists before disappearing.
Shiri Silberman-Bibas, 30, hid in a safe room with her husband Yarden and their nine-month-old Kfir and three-year-old Ariel as Israel was invaded by the militants on Saturday.
Armed with only a small pistol, Yarden hoped to defend his family and their home on Kibbutz Nir Oz when villages were raided – an attack that killed hundreds of Israelis and took over 100 hostage.
The father reportedly texted his relatives “I love you all” while they hid as militants fired semi-automatic weapons outside their window. Half an hour later he texted menacingly, “They’re coming in,” before communications stopped.
The family has not been heard from since, and Shiri’s parents, Yosi and Margit Silberman, who are in their late 60s, are also missing and fear they will be kidnapped.
A video later emerged showing the distraught mother hugging her two children as they were kidnapped, as horrified onlookers screamed: “She’s having a baby.”
Shiri Silberman-Bibas, 30, is believed to have been kidnapped along with her nine-month-old Kfir and three-year-old Ariel
Israeli supporters held up pictures of the mother and her boys being abducted at a vigil outside Downing Street in London, with a poster saying: “Let the children go.”
Social media footage of Shiri sobbing as she and her children are taken away by the militants has sparked fear
Shiri and her young boys were apparently forced into armored vehicles by Hamas militants after their village was stormed
The whereabouts of three-year-old Ariel and nine-month-old Kfir are unknown after Hamas terrorists kidnapped their family
Social media footage of Shiri sobbing as she and her children are taken away by the militants has sparked fear in the Jewish community worldwide.
The mother’s horrified expression and images of her innocent sons in happier times have been used by protesters around the world to show the horrors Hamas has inflicted on Israel.
Distraught Israelis at a vigil outside Downing Street in London held up pictures of the mother and her boys being kidnapped, with a poster saying: “Let the children go.”
The missing grandmother Margit is a kindergarten teacher who suffers from Parkinson’s disease and supposedly urgently needs her medication.
Shiri’s niece, Yifat Zailer, who spoke to The New York Times, said she would not rest until her relatives returned home.
“I just hope that they’re alive and that they’re together. And I want them to be home with me so I can give them a big hug again,” she said.
“We feel like those in charge don’t know what to do because this is a situation we’ve never been in before.” “That’s the feeling in Israel,” she added. “It is a disaster.”
Her family isn’t the only one rounded up and taken from Nir Oz.
Father-of-two Yoni Asher said he received a call from his panicked wife telling him terrorists had stormed into the house.
Doron Asher Katz, 34, was visiting her mother in the settlement with her two daughters, ages two and four, when Hamas attacked.
After losing contact with her, Mr Asher saw a video on social media of her being loaded into a cart by militants.
“I certainly identified my wife, my two daughters and my mother-in-law on some sort of cart, with Hamas terrorists all around them,” he said.
He was able to locate his wife’s cell phone and saw that it was in Khan Yunis, a city in the southern Gaza Strip.
Doron Asher Katz, 34, was visiting her mother in Nir Oz, near the Gaza border, with her two daughters, ages two and four, when Hamas attacked
He said, “My two little girls, they’re just babies, they’re not even five and three years old yet.”
“I don’t know in what way they’re trapped. ‘I don’t know what happened to them.’
Mr. Asher has appealed directly to Hamas not to harm his family and has even offered to barter for their safe return.
Another young family from the same village, near Israel’s border with Gaza, is believed to have been murdered by the terrorists.
Tamar and Yonatan Kedem and their three children Shachar, Arbel and Omer were all reportedly killed by Hamas on Kibbutz Nir Oz.
Tamar and Yonatan Kedem, as well as their children Shachar, Arbel and Omer, were all reportedly murdered by Hamas
Tamar’s last social media post was made the night before Hamas invaded Israel
Israel’s official X-Account reports their deaths: “Tamar, Yonatan and their children Shachar, Arbel, Omer.” An entire family was wiped out by Hamas terrorists.
‘There are no words for that. May her memory be a blessing.’
Several key figures condemned the family’s murder, including Israel’s former prime minister Naftali Bennett, who wrote on X: “An entire family was murdered in cold blood.”
“Look at their happy faces. Their love. They were all murdered by Palestinian terrorists on Kibbutz Nir-Oz. Just because they are Jews.’
About 150 Israelis, many of them civilians, are believed to have been kidnapped by the militants in the bloodiest incursion into Israel’s territory in its 50-year history.
Footage shows terrified children, mothers and elderly people being loaded into vehicles by heavily armed men before being taken to Gaza.
Weeping Israelis held a vigil outside Downing Street, holding up pictures of Kfir and Ariel
Pro-Israel demonstrators protest near Downing Street in London during the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas
The mother appears to be pleading with the militants as she desperately clings to her two young sons
Gunmen reportedly went door-to-door rounding up entire families seeking shelter from rocket fire from Gaza that was fired at settlements.
It has even been suggested that an elderly Holocaust survivor was among those dragged across the border, and it is feared that two Britons were also among those held.
Meanwhile, fears are growing that their fate lies in the hands of the militants, with one young woman’s friend saying: “God knows what they are doing to them.”
Now the group has announced that it will execute the hostages one by one without warning in retaliation for every new Israeli bombing of civilian homes without warning.
Abu Obaida, spokesman for Hamas’ armed wing, the IQB, said they had acted in accordance with Islamic instructions by bringing Israeli prisoners to safety.
He blamed Israel’s intended move on increased bombing and killing of civilians in their homes through airstrikes without warning them.
“We have decided to put an end to this and declare from now on that any attack on our people in their homes without prior warning will unfortunately result in the execution of one of the civilians we are holding hostage,” he said.
Gaza City was devastated by airstrikes today in response to Hamas’ surprise attack on Saturday.
Israel today ordered a “full siege” of the city, cutting off electricity, fuel and food to Gaza’s 2.3 million people.