An Israeli military spokesman appeared to confirm reports this morning that Hamas militants were beheading babies in their ruthless attacks this weekend that killed hundreds of Israeli civilians in their homes.
Israel Defense Forces spokesman Jonathan Conricus said a forensic doctor who visited the aftermath of the massacre at a kibbutz near the Gaza Strip saw the children’s bodies and confirmed how they died.
“I admit it took us some time to really understand and verify this report and it was hard to believe that even Hamas could commit such a barbaric act,” he said in comments to the BBC.
“I think we can now say with relative certainty that Hamas did exactly that… there were mutilated bodies strewn everywhere.”
Immediately after the Hamas attacks, reports circulated that the terrorists had raped women and children and beheaded infants, but these were later dismissed as misinformation.
But Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu claimed the attackers committed various atrocities, including tying up boys and girls and shooting them in the head, burning people alive, raping women and beheading soldiers. He also shared a picture of a blood-stained child’s bed with the caption, “Hamas is worse than ISIS.”
IDF spokesman Maj. Doron Spielman later told NBC News that he could not confirm how many babies had been beheaded.
But then he added: “What I can confirm is that there were numerous witness statements and evidence found on site that children were grotesquely murdered and their body parts removed.”
October 11, 2023 – Kfar Aza, Israel: Soldiers cry at the sight of a family dining table with challah bread from Friday Kiddush still on it. Soldiers from the IDF Lotar unit slowly check the kibbutz, going from one house to another to clear them of any ammunition or threats
An Israel Defense Forces source provided a photo of the blood-soaked child’s bed at Kibbutz Kerem Shalom after a Hamas-led attack on the house
A house is completely destroyed after it was burned down by Hamas militants during the attack on Kibbutz Be’eri near the Gaza border on October 11, 2023 in Be’eri, Israel
An Israeli soldier walks past a house destroyed by Hamas militants in Kibbutz Be’eri, Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu claimed in social media posts that the attackers committed various atrocities, including tying up boys and girls and shooting them in the head, burning people alive, raping women and beheading soldiers
According to Israeli soldiers, Hamas terrorists are believed to have beheaded babies and shot entire families in their homes in a small kibbutz in Israel
An IDF soldier covers his face before removing the body of a civilian killed days earlier in an attack by Hamas terrorists on Tuesday
A soldier is overcome with emotion as he searches for bodies on the kibbutz
Israeli soldiers recover the body of a civilian killed days earlier in an attack by Palestinian militants on this Kibbutz Kfar Aza, near the Gaza border
Rescue workers and witnesses have described horrific scenes, including the slaughter of elderly people and finding bloodied rooms full of massacred civilians.
When asked about the atrocities in a media briefing this morning, another IDF spokesman, Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, said he “cannot deny” the reports of the beheadings of young children but refused to confirm whether they were proven.
He said the reports came from a journalist who spoke to IDF soldiers at Kibbutz Kfar Aza, who, like Be’eri, suffered terrible atrocities and many civilian casualties.
“I would like to believe that if our 45-year-old reservist told a journalist what he saw, he would not have spewed IDF news,” Hecht said at the press conference, according to SkyNews.
“I don’t know… I can’t deny it.”
Speaking to US President Joe Biden yesterday about Hamas atrocities, Netanyahu said: “We have never seen such cruelty in the history of the state, nor since the Holocaust,” before referring to scenes of Nazi brutality against Ukrainians expelled Babyn Yar during World War II.
“They took dozens of children, tied them up, burned them and executed them.” They beheaded soldiers, they mowed down these kids who came to a nature festival, you know, they put five jeeps around this depression in the ground and whatnot Babyn Yar they mowed them down and made sure they killed everyone,” he said.
“They are even worse than ISIS and we must treat them as such.”
Rescue workers and witnesses have described horrific scenes, including the slaughter of elderly people and finding bloodied rooms full of massacred civilians.
Militants in Gaza are also holding an estimated 150 people taken hostage by Israel – soldiers, men, women, children and older adults – and have fired thousands of rockets into Israel over the past five days.
Two Israeli kibbutz in particular – Be’eri and Kfar Aza – suffered heinous atrocities at the hands of Hamas militants.
Kibbutz Kfar Aza is considered the place where the worst atrocities against babies occurred due to its popularity among young parents. It was one of the first Israeli settlements to be attacked by rampaging terrorists on Saturday morning.
Here, armed Hamas fighters with assault rifles and grenades shot dead screaming families begging for their lives before setting fire to their homes.
The terror began shortly after dawn, when most of the 400 residents living there were sleeping or enjoying breakfast.
The first wave of 70 terrorists had raced toward the quiet kibbutz on motorcycles after breaching the border fence a mile away, while others paraglided over Israel’s unsuspecting defenses outside Gaza.
Once they arrived, the heavily armed fighters attacked the compound from four directions – starting with the “baby district” on the west side, where the young families lived.
This graphic (above) shows how the horrific Hamas massacre took place at Kibbutz Kfar Aza
Israeli soldiers walk next to the bodies of Hamas militants killed at Kibbutz Kfar Aza on Tuesday
Troops remove the bodies of victims killed in an attack by Hamas terrorists in Kfar Aza on Tuesday
A woman’s body is covered with a blanket in Kfar Azza
After the attack, a child’s seat and a child’s dress are splattered with blood
Gunshots and bloodstains litter the walls and door of a house on the kibbutz near the Gaza border
The terrorists were met by a distressed kibbutz guard, who was among a small group of residents with military experience who were patrolling the perimeter when they saw the swarm of black figures approaching them.
They, like the Israeli military and government, were unprepared for the wave of terrorists who fired shots at them. The small security unit tried in vain to protect their neighbors but was unable to stop the terrorists and was killed.
Ruthless armed Hamas fighters moved quickly through the kibbutz, first killing a 90-year-old grandmother who had been sitting on her porch. They dragged the frightened woman into her living room and shot her twice in the head.
Families were awakened by gunshots and voices outside their homes. Frightened parents ran to their sleeping children, dragging them from their beds and cots before putting them in safe rooms or closets.
Among those parents were Itay and Hadar Berichevsky, both 30, who heard the gunmen trying to break down their front door.
The desperate parents took their 10-month-old twins to a hidden shelter just before Hamas terrorists stormed into their home and shot the couple dead.
The terrorists then systematically moved from house to house, blowing open front doors with their rocket grenades and unleashing a hail of bullets on the men, women and children living there. Entire families were handcuffed before being shot one by one at close range, soldiers said.
Shocking images from the crime scene show a baby’s car seat covered in blood, with her little bloody dress lying next to it.
Hamas gunmen then set fire to several houses in the kibbutz in a nefarious attempt to force the families out so they could shoot them as soon as they reached their yards.
Meanwhile, in Be’eri, just a stone’s throw from Kfar Aza, sickening photos emerged of Israeli civilians lying in their beds riddled with bullet holes.
Most of the photos forwarded to Web by the Israeli embassy in London were too graphic to publish
The houses in the community were largely decimated by Hamas terrorists
In Be’eri, just a few miles from the Gaza border, cars were abandoned in the middle of the road
A body lies on the ground in Kibbutz Beeri in southern Israel on October 11, 2023, after a mass infiltration by armed Hamas fighters from the Gaza Strip
A mortar shell lies in the grass in Kibbutz Be’eri on October 11, 2023, after the attacks
Horrifying photos too graphic to publish showed a woman lying face down in bed in a pool of blood with six gaping holes in her mottled, rotting skin.
Beside her, a man with dark hair slipped awkwardly into a gap between the bed and the wall.
His black clothes, which looked like pajamas, were still slick with his blood, which pooled in a dark red mass on the floor below him.
You could see his body decomposing – his face was blackened and his arms were covered in boils. Pieces of flesh were missing from his right arm and hand.
Outside, several cars have been flattened, while the bodies of people in everyday clothing lie in awkward positions.
The more than 100 bodies found at the kibbutz were removed by the Zaka search and rescue group, which warned that the death toll could rise.
A screenshot from a video confirmed by CNN shows the terrifying moment Hamas butchers arrived at Kibbutz Be’eri, where they murdered at least 100 people
At least 100 people were killed by Hamas terrorists in the early hours of Saturday
The number of deaths confirmed in Be’eri could rise in the coming days
Israeli soldiers mobilize on October 11 in response to the attacks on Kibbutz Be’eri
Israeli soldiers ride in military vehicles as they gather at Kibbutz Beeri in southern Israel following a mass infiltration by armed Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip, October 11, 2023
This image from video provided by South First Responders shows charred and damaged cars along a desert road after an attack by Hamas militants at the Tribe of Nova Trance music festival near Kibbutz Re’im in southern Israel on Saturday, October 7 2023
One survivor, Haim Jelin, told local media that Hamas fighters “walked around Be’eri as if they owned the place.”
“They shot indiscriminately, kidnapped whoever they could, burned people’s houses so that they had to escape through the window where the terrorists were waiting,” he added.
A woman named Miri Gad Mesika told local media that she and her husband suffocated from thick smoke and gas fumes as they tried to hide.
“We soaked towels with water and covered our faces while my husband Eli held the shelter door shut as tightly as he could while the terrorists tried to break in,” she said.
“Just before jumping from the second floor, we assessed the fire situation, looked for the terrorists and decided to jump.”
“We fled to our neighbors across the street and watched our house go up in flames before it burned down completely. ‘I have no idea how we survived.’