At a screening for diplomats and the media, Israel showed images of the October 7 bloodbath – scenes reminiscent of the Holocaust. A late counterattack in the public relations battle.
In a panic, the father grabs his two sons, perhaps eight and six years old, all three wearing only dark underwear. He drags them to the shelter of the kibbutz, where they seek refuge from the intruders who throw a grenade. Smoke rises and then the father is lying on the ground, apparently shot. An attacker jumps through the window and the children run screaming into the house. As they crouch on the sofa, one of the perpetrators takes a sip from the bottle of Coca-Cola in the fridge.
“I want to go to my mother’s house”, says a brother, with traces of blood on his body. “This is no joke,” replies the other. “I think we’re going to die.” And finally: “Why am I still alive?” When the mother finally appears at the scene of the crime, accompanied by soldiers and obviously hours later, and sees her husband in the pool of blood, she faints. And the kids? They disappeared from the scene.
Like concentration camp photos
It is one of the most shocking scenes of the three-quarter hour demonstration of the massacre of Israeli civilians and soldiers by Hamas, exactly a month ago, which the Israeli embassy in Vienna organized in a hotel room for diplomats, military attachés and journalists. The images of horror and carnage, edited together from photographs of the terrorists, recordings from the victims’ cell phones and surveillance cameras, often time-stamped, are sometimes reminiscent of the Holocaust. The corpses, some of which are twisted, disfigured, scantily dressed and charred, resemble images from Nazi concentration camps. And they are often so unbearable that people leave the screening early, crying.
Streets full of corpses, the noise of Kalashnikovs, the hunt for visitors to the music festival in the desert, the “executions” of drivers, the wounded and a dog, the terrorists’ gestures of jubilation and triumph: Israeli parliamentarians also have similar photos and Videos of prominent politicians on solidarity visits, such as US President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, were difficult to digest in the early days after the massacre.
7/10: The terror code against Israel
It took four weeks for Israel to present the images to a selected audience in order to counter Hamas on the propaganda front. The terrorist organization is flooding social media with its images, with photos of civilian victims in the Gaza Strip and children being pulled from the rubble. Although the war in Gaza continues and causes thousands of civilian casualties, Israel appears to have already lost the propaganda war. The further back the terror of October 7th is, the more the more than 1,400 Israeli deaths disappear in the eyes of the world.
Israel has so far acted extremely discreetly in the public relations war. Now he has obtained the consent of the victims’ families to anchor the horror images in their consciousness. In Israel, they will not be forgotten anyway – many have even tattooed the date 7/10, following the example of 9/11. The echo of “Never again” reverberates throughout the country.
The euphoria of the perpetrators
The euphoria with which Hamas celebrated the bloodbath is also demonstrated by radio communication among themselves and cell phone conversations with families. “I killed ten Jews with my own hands. “Your blood is on my hands,” one of them tells his father. “Mom, I’m a hero”, he is proud. Someone walks across the music festival battlefield, counting the corpses of young people, possibly his age – until he loses track. “Is anyone still alive here?” he asks. “Everyone is dead,” he states, almost to his own surprise – and satisfaction.
The call “Allahu akhbar” resounds again and again! One commander appeals to another: “Hang the soldier in al-Alam Square.” Hamas thugs trample corpses and step on the head of a dead soldier. “Jalla, jalla!” – “Faster!”
Faced with scenes of dehumanization, David Roet, Israel’s ambassador to Austria, states: “There is no difference between the Islamic State and Hamas.” At the end he apologizes for the film and wipes his eyes.