Israel-Hamas War: Some escaped on foot, but many were killed or taken hostage – city left in shock
Surrounded by destruction, and in the midst of a few local people dazed and frankly in shock after the events of Saturday and Hamas’s attack, I prepared to leave the city of Sderot.
Gunmen had careered through its streets on the back of four-wheel drives shooting up cars, killing drivers, and then dismounting and hunting down residents to either kill or take hostage and move to Gaza.
As I approached our vehicle, I caught sight of a hospital gurney somewhat haphazardly abandoned next to two cars.
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I decided to take a look and saw the gurney and two stretchers on the floor were covered in blood.
The two cars were riddled with bullets, their interiors splattered with blood.
In one vehicle I saw two children’s car seats, one for a baby, and another that looked like it belonged to a toddler.
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Around the cars were dozens of rubber gloves that had clearly been peeled off and thrown away.
I turned a corner and encountered a rabbi wearing a bulletproof vest, along with two assistants, who were tending to the bodies of what looked like two people rolled up, separately, in plastic.
They haven’t had time to identify and remove the victims yet. This type of scene isn’t uncommon in southern Israel at the moment.
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There are pockets of destruction along the borderline with Gaza where the Hamas fighters breached the Israeli defensive system and wreaked havoc in towns, villages, and kibbutzim.
The numbers of people killed or missing continues to rise.
Survivors like Ytzhak Shitrit, who witnessed the attack in Sderot and hid in his home all day praying the gunmen wouldn’t find him, are suffering.
He was friendly when I approached him, and he told me what happened – in reality he can’t believe he survived.
“I was shocked, shocked, I heard the shooting, and I couldn’t believe it,” he said gesturing wildly.
“6am on a Saturday, on a holiday, it was scary, very scary.”
He hid in his shelter. “We went inside immediately and then we heard the constant shooting, and it sounded like it was in our living room.”
Ytzhak lives opposite the main police station that was taken over by the Hamas gunmen who killed at least 20 police officers.
In the end the Israeli forces destroyed the police station to take back control.
In many ways it’s a symbol of a security system that simply failed.
Standing looking at the heap of mangled rubble, Major Doron Spielman came over and introduced himself to me.
“A couple hours ago there was shooting in this city, the place we are standing in now just yesterday women and children were gunned down and were dragged from here back to the Gaza Strip,” he explained to me.
“Even when we as the IDF, when one person is killed we take it as a personal loss and personal responsibility, here with hundreds of people being killed we will do the most thorough analysis we have ever done, we’ll make sure that never happens again, but that’s going to be for tomorrow, today we have to do everything to protect our civilians, restore peace to the people of Israel, and make sure Hamas never again do this carnage to the people of Israel.”
The road leading to Sderot is lined with family cars attacked by Hamas as they moved towards the city in this surprise attack.
An abandoned car damaged by gunfire
The cars are abandoned where they were ambushed. Belongings are strewn across the road, and next to some cars pools of blood are dried in the hot sun, marking the tarmac.
A handful of vehicles are completely burnt out, inside police and army investigators were sifting through the remains, looking for clues to the identity of the owners and the victims.
Some people escaped on foot, but many were killed or taken hostage and driven the short distance to Gaza.
At a petrol station we came across SWAT teams, stationed here to try to retrieve hostages taken by Hamas and possibly still inside Israel – among them are negotiators.
But this is an ongoing war and you’re never far from it.
While we were filming the air reverberated to the sound of Israel’s Iron Dome air defence shield picking off rockets fired from Gaza.
And mingled within the noise was the sound of helicopter gunships firing into Gaza, attack drones in the skies, and jets carrying out regular sorties against Hamas targets in the Strip.
The defence forces are still securing the border but there is already a huge build-up of soldiers and hardware.
We watched as multiple armoured personnel carriers with Israeli flags attached, rumbled their way across the flat farmlands towards Gaza.
An Israeli incursion is coming, and it will be bloody.
The government is in no mood for mercy, and that will inevitably cost the lives of civilians.
A Gaza deal is “on the brink”, President Joe Biden has said in his final foreign policy address.
The outgoing US leader said it would include a hostage release deal and a “surge” of aid to Palestinians.
“So many innocent people have been killed, so many communities have been destroyed. Palestinian people deserve
peace,” he said.
“The deal would free the hostages, halt the fighting, provide security to Israel, and allow us to significantly surge humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians who suffered terribly in this war that Hamas started.”
Pic: Reuters
The US president also hailed Washington’s support for Israel during two Iranian attacks in 2024.
“All told, Iran is weaker than it’s been in decades,” he said.
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Mr Biden was delivering his final foreign policy address before he leaves office next week.
Monday’s address will be the penultimate time he speaks to the country before the end of his presidency. He is due to give a farewell address on Wednesday.
US and Arab mediators made significant progress overnight toward brokering a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war and the release of scores of hostages held in the Gaza Strip – but a deal has not been reached yet, officials said.
A round of ceasefire talks will be held in Doha on Tuesday to finalise remaining details related to a ceasefire deal in Gaza – including over the release of up to 33 hostages – officials added.
Mr Biden went on to claim America’s adversaries were weaker than when he took office four years ago and that the US was “winning the worldwide competition”.
“Compared to four years ago, America is stronger, our alliances are stronger, our adversaries and competitors are
weaker,” he said.
“We have not gone to war to make these things happen.”
World
IDF admits ‘serious offence’ after using vehicle marked ambulance in raid in which a grandmother was killed
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) has admitted to a “serious offence” after a Sky News investigation analysed CCTV footage showing the moment an 80-year-old Palestinian grandmother was shot in the West Bank.
Halima Abu Leil was shot during a raid in Nablus. The grandmother died soon after.
During the course of the investigation, we noted that a blue vehicle marked as an ambulance and with a red light on its roof was used by IDF troops to enter the West Bank.
Our investigation stated: “Figures who appear to be Israeli military forces exit the ambulance in the foreground. They are equipped with helmets, backpacks, rifles, and other gear.”
The use of a marked medical vehicle for a security operation could be a contravention of the Geneva Convention and a war crime – as well as Halima’s killing.
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CCTV shows Palestinian grandmother shot in IDF raid
The IDF has subsequently told Sky News: “On December 19, 2024, soldiers from the ‘Duvdevan’ unit took part in an operational mission to detain terrorists in Nablus.
“During the operation, an ambulance-like vehicle was used for operational purposes, without authorisation and without the relevant commanders’ approval.”
It added: “The use of the ambulance-like vehicle during the operation was a serious offence, exceeding authority, and a violation of existing orders and procedures.”
It also said the commander of the ‘Duvdevan’ unit was “reprimanded”.
However, it gave no update into the death of Halima, saying “the circumstances of the incident are being examined”.
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The United Nations Special Rapporteur on occupied Palestinian territory Francesca Albanese watched the CCTV video and told Sky News her death could be a “war crime”.
She said: “When I look at the footage, what emerges prima facie is that there were no precautions taken – within these operations whose legality is debatable – to avoid or spare civilian life.
“No principle of proportionality because there was wildfire directed at the identified target and ultimately no respect for the principle of distinction.
“So this was a murder in cold blood and could be a war crime as an extrajudicial killing.”
According to the United Nations Office Of Human Rights in occupied Palestinian territory, Israeli security forces and settlers have killed at least 813 mostly unarmed Palestinians, including 15 women and 177 children, since 7 October 2023.
Ukraine’s president is offering a prisoner swap with North Korean soldiers it has captured, in exchange for Ukrainians held by Russia.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has made a direct appeal to leader Kim Jong Un after seizing two North Koreans in Russia’s Kursk region.
“In addition to the first captured soldiers from North Korea, there will undoubtedly be more. It’s only a matter of time before our troops manage to capture others,” he said in a video posted on X.
His video also included an offer of help to officials in California fighting the ongoing fires there.
It is the first time Ukraine has announced the capture of North Korean soldiers since their entry into the nearly three-year-old war last autumn.
Ukrainian and Western assessments say that some 11,000 troops from Russia‘s ally North Korea have been deployed in the Kursk region to support Moscow’s forces, although Russia has neither confirmed nor denied their presence.
Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un met in Pyongyang to sign a ‘military pact’ in June 2024. Pic: Kremlin Photo/AP
Mr Zelenskyy has said Russian and North Korean forces had suffered heavy losses.
“Ukraine is ready to hand over Kim Jong Un’s soldiers to him if he can organise their exchange for our warriors who are being held captive in Russia,” Mr Zelenskyy added.
He posted a short video showing the interrogation of two men, presented as North Korean soldiers.
One of them is lying on a bed with bandaged hands, the other is sitting with a bandage on his jaw.
Ukraine said on Saturday it had captured two North Korean soldiers. Pic: Volodymyr Zelenskyy/X
One of the men said through an interpreter that he did not know he was fighting against Ukraine and had been told he was on a training exercise. He said he hid in a shelter during the offensive and was found a couple of days later.
He said that if he was ordered to return to North Korea, he would, but he was ready to stay in Ukraine if given the chance.
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Sky News has not been able to verify the video.
“One of them (soldiers) expressed a desire to stay in Ukraine, the other to return to Korea,” said Mr Zelenskyy, adding that for North Korean soldiers who did not wish to return home, there may be other options available.
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