The video began circulating on social media on Sunday and – alongside footage of harrowing kidnappings from the same event – has been scrutinized by horrified families desperate for news of loved ones missing since a series of coordinated attacks triggered Israel’s declaration of war on Sunday.

Israeli officials counted at least 260 bodies near the site of the Nova festival, outside Re’im, where earlier footage showed carefree partygoers from Israel and overseas dancing in the desert soon after sunrise on Saturday.

Some survivors are among more than 100 hostages that the militant group Hamas claims to be holding in Gaza, according to friends and family members who have seen them in videos shared on social platforms.

The first clip, begins at 9:23 a.m. according to its timecode, just under three hours after the first explosions were reported at the Nova festival.

The video has no audio, but a militant is seen yelling, then pointing his machine gun at a man taking cover next to the car. It’s unclear if the gunman is firing a warning shot, or if he’s just shot and injured the civilian, who is then seen being led away. His fate is unknown.

A second individual is seen in the video lying on the ground at the back of another car. The person begins to move and suddenly another militant appears on screen, aims at the person, fires and walks away. The person on the ground stops moving.

Another video from the dashcam, timestamped at 12:09 p.m., shows two militants approach the body of the second individual. They rifle through the person’s pockets, and one picks something off the body and puts it into his own back pocket.

Less than three minutes later, militants grab a woman out of the back of the car. She is led away, and the militants begin to open another car’s trunk and empty a suitcase on the ground to be pilfered.

The video picks up at 12:14 p.m., with the captured woman running back into view. Her hands in the air, she appears to be waving toward the festival grounds.

Dirt and dust are seen flying as bullets hit the ground around her. Next to the emptied suitcase and open trunk, she takes cover again. Her fate is unknown.

Families search for missing children

Ricarda Louk last saw her daughter Shani lying face down in the back of a pickup truck heading to the Gaza Strip, an isolated coastal enclave of almost 2 million people crammed into 140 square miles.

She last spoke to her after hearing rockets and alarms sounding in southern Israel, and phoned her daughter to see if she’d made it to a secure location. Shani told her mother she was at the festival, held in an open field with few places to hide.

Aerial footage posted on social media showed dozens of cars along the side of the road near the entrance to the festival grounds, some burned, others with windows missing and doors hanging open.

Shani was trying to reach one of those vehicles, her mother said.

The disturbing video of her daughter in the back of the pickup truck and attempts by someone to use Shani’s credit card twice in Gaza after the attack are the only hints she has of her daughter’s whereabouts.

In the video, she is seen motionless. One gunman, carrying a rocket propelled grenade launcher, has his leg draped over her waist and the other holds a clump of her dreadlocks. “Allahu Akbar,” they cheer – meaning “God is great” in Arabic.

Ricarda hopes she will see her daughter again, but the situation is bleak.

“It looks very bad, but I still have hope. I hope that they don’t take bodies for negotiations. I hope that she’s still alive somewhere. We don’t have anything else to hope for, so I try to believe,” she said.

Hiding for hours, then …

Like Ricarda Louk, Yakov Argamani last saw his daughter on one of the cellphone videos that have emerged in the aftermath of Saturday’s raid.

Noa Argamani, 25, is seen pleading for help from the back of a motorcycle driven by Hamas militants at the festival site.

Noa was attending the festival with her boyfriend, Avinatan Or, who is also seen being led away by militants.

Or texted Noa’s father around 10 a.m. to say the couple were safe, almost four hours after the first reports of an attack. Other friends also texted, begging for help, Marciano said.

“Since that, no contact. We suppose they were abducted at 12. They probably were hiding for three, four hours begging for help. They started hiding after hearing the massacres and the shooting. And then (the militants) found them,” Marciano said.

Now Yakov is relying on his faith, Marciano said.

“He believes in God. He’s praying that she’s okay. And she will come back to him, to the family and to us safely. She’s their only child.”

Israel’s defense minister ordered a “complete siege” of Gaza on Monday, as the military said it had retaken control of Israeli communities near the coastal enclave that were stormed by Hamas gunmen in an unprecedented attack over the weekend.

Yoav Gallant said Israel would halt he supply of electricity, food, water and fuel to Gaza. “I have given an order – Gaza will be under complete siege,” Gallant said. “We are fighting barbarians and will respond accordingly.”

Israel has retaken control of all communities around Gaza and there is no ongoing fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas militants inside Israel, the Israeli military said on Monday, following continued assaults by both sides.

The announcement by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari came more than 48 hours after Hamas launched a surprise assault with thousands of rockets and sent armed fighters into Israel.

Israel on Sunday formally declared war on the Islamist militant group Hamas after its fighters launched an unprecedented attack that has so far killed more than 700 people in Israel. Israeli jets continued to bombard the Palestinian enclave of Gaza on Monday as the war entered its third day.

Israeli strikes in Gaza have killed at least 493, including dozens of children, and left 2,651 injured, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

An incursion by Gaza militants of this scale has not been seen in Israel since the nation’s founding in 1948.

Earlier Monday, as Israeli forces battled to expel the last assailants, Hamas launched a fresh barrage of rocket attacks. Sirens warning of incoming rockets in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv sounded at noon local time (5 a.m. ET).

Hamas militants claimed late Sunday to be holding more than 100 hostages in Gaza, including high-ranking Israeli army officers, according to Mousa Abu Marzouk, chief deputy of Hamas’ political bureau.

Videos on social media showed militants capturing multiple civilians, including children, as Israeli families across the nation made anxious pleas for the safe return of their loved ones.

In addition to Israeli captives, there are also other nationalities believed to have been taken hostage, including American, Mexican, Brazilian and Thai nationals – further complicating Israel’s response to the Hamas attack.

For now, airstrikes have been the primary retaliation measure within Gaza itself, with Israeli jets repeatedly pounding the heavily populated 140 square mile coastal strip, turning multiple buildings to rubble.

The IDF says it has been hitting Hamas, destroying around 800 targets and killing “hundreds” of fighters, wounding thousands and capturing scores of others, spokesperson Hagari said Sunday.

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced in Gaza, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency said, and access to medical care has been complicated by Israel cutting power to the territory, threatening the “lives of hundreds” of those injured, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said.

While it remains unclear what the full scale of the Israeli response will be, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday predicted a “long and difficult war” and vowed “mighty vengeance” on Hamas.

Sounds of battle

IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Richard Hecht said on Sunday that the priority for the coming hours and days was to “control the entire enclave and kill all the terrorists in our territory.” Israeli fighters continued to clash with Hamas militants on Israeli soil earlier Monday morning in up to eight locations.

Israel’s declaration of war set the stage for a major military operation in Gaza and tanks and personnel carriers could be seen on the move near the Israel-Gaza border on Sunday.

Thousands of Israeli reservists have been called up and the IDF announced that several communities close to the Gaza security fence are being evacuated.

An Israeli military official and a United States defense official said Israel is requesting precision guided bombs and additional Iron Dome interceptors from the US, including Joint Direct Attack Munitions, or JDAMs – a kit that turns an unguided “dumb” bomb into a precision “smart” weapon.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the US will provide security assistance to Israel imminently. The US said it was also sending a Navy carrier strike group to the eastern Mediterranean Sea, including guided missile destroyers and guided missile cruisers.

Horror on the ground

Many Israelis have spent much of the past two days in bomb shelters and saferooms.

Throughout the bloody weekend, Hamas rockets made direct hits on multiple locations inside the country including Tel Aviv, while armed terror groups entered Israel and infiltrated military bases, towns and farms, shooting at civilians and taking hostages.

Among those killed in Israel are 12 Thai citizens, 10 Nepalis, four US nationals, two Ukrainians, one French and one British citizen.

Images and videos show the horror unfolding on the ground.

Photos released by the Israeli foreign ministry showed dozens of bodies in the aftermath of a Hamas attack on a music festival near the Israel-Gaza border, which emergency responders said left at least 260 dead.

“One couldn’t describe it with words. It’s impossible… It was a very difficult moment,” Yakov Argamani said, describing the moment he saw the video of his 25-year-old daughter Noa for the first time.

The IDF said early Monday that Be’eri was “very badly hit,” and although most Hamas militants in the kibbutz had been killed, Israeli troops were still fighting there.

Israeli warplanes continued striking Gaza overnight Sunday into Monday and “severely degraded the capabilities” of Hamas, the IDF said. Among the targets was a structure that housed Hamas operatives and several Hamas command centers, including one belonging to a senior operative of the Hamas naval forces.

The barrage of Israeli strikes in Gaza has also inflicted casualties on civilians in what is one of the world’s most densely populated places.

At least 13 family members, including four toddlers, were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Khan Younis in southern Gaza Sunday, according to journalist Hassan Eslayeh and a family relative.

Regional concerns of escalation

The attacks come after months of surging violence between Palestinians and Israelis, with the long-running conflict now heading into uncharted and dangerous new territory. Questions remain over how the Israeli military and intelligence apparatus appeared to be caught off guard in one of the country’s worst security failures.

Hamas’ highly coordinated assault, which began Saturday morning, was unprecedented in its scale and scope and came on the 50th anniversary of the 1973 War in which Arab states blitzed Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

Fighting between the two sides has surged in the past two years. The violence has been driven by frequent Israeli military raids in Palestinian towns and cities, which Israel has said are a necessary response to a rising number of attacks by Palestinian militants on Israelis.

Concerns the conflict could spill out into the region were raised Sunday when Lebanese group Hezbollah claimed responsibility for targeting three Israeli sites in an area known as Shebaa Farms, using missiles and artillery. The area is considered by Lebanon as Israeli-occupied.

The IDF said its artillery struck the area in Lebanon where the firing originated and said it “will continue to operate in all regions and at any time necessary to ensure the safety of the Israeli civilians.”

On Sunday, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting but no action was taken afterward. The Deputy US Ambassador to the UN said “not all” the member nations had condemned Hamas’ attacks, but did not specify which. All 15 members need to vote unanimously for the UNSC to release a statement.

The large-scale surprise attack by Gaza militants on Israel on Saturday has left hundreds of Israelis dead, prompting a lethal volley of retaliatory Israeli airstrikes and a formal declaration of war on Sunday.

“Citizens of Israel, we are at war – not in an operation, not in rounds – at war,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video message shortly after the militant group Hamas, which controls the coastal enclave of Gaza, fired a barrage of rockets and sent gunmen into Israel in a multi-pronged and unprecedented attack in the long-running conflict.

Over a thousand people have died so far, with more than 700 Israelis killed under the Hamas assault and more than 400 Palestinians dead as Israel pounds Gaza with airstrikes.

Still unknown are the fates of at least 100 hostages, including Israeli soldiers, that Hamas says it captured.

Here’s what we know so far.

What happened?

Around 6:30 a.m. local time on Saturday, when many Israelis were likely to have been asleep, sirens were heard as far as the Tel Aviv area as rockets flew over Israel.

Militants from Gaza then entered Israel by land, sea and air, with some using paragliders, the IDF said.

The IDF said around 2,200 rockets were fired at Israel. Hamas put the figure at 5,000. To put that in context, some 4,000 rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel during the 50-day war between the two sides in 2014.

Hamas military commander Muhammad Al-Deif called the operation “Al-Aqsa Storm” and said that the assault on Israel was a response to attacks on women, the desecration of the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and the ongoing siege of Gaza.

Hamas said in a statement the same day that its fighters were still present in southern Israeli cities, and that the group was supporting them with rocket fire in the cities of Ofakim, Sderot, Yad Mordechai, Kfar Aza, Be’eri, Yated, and Kissufim.

How has Israel responded?

In response to the attack, Israel launched “Operation Swords of Iron,” striking a number of targets in the Gaza strip. Netanyahu said Israel’s response to the Hamas incursion will “exact a huge price” from the group.

The IDF urged civilians in Gaza to leave their residential areas immediately for their safety as Israeli military operations continued to target Hamas.

Inside Gaza, the roar of Israeli warplanes could be heard followed by loud explosions and rising plumes of black smoke.

At least 313 people were killed over 24 hours, including at least 20 children, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said Sunday. Another 1,990 were injured, it added.

On Sunday, the IDF said it struck 426 targets in Gaza, including 10 towers it said were used by Hamas.

In the north, Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group claimed responsibility for targeting three Israeli sites in an area known as Shebaa Farms using missiles and artillery. The area is considered by Lebanon as Israeli-occupied. Israel responded by firing artillery.

And in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, seven Palestinians were killed by Israeli soldiers on Saturday when clashes broke out after the Israeli army blocked West Bank cities, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

How did the two sides get here?

Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians have existed since before the nation’s founding in 1948. Thousands of people on both sides have been killed and many more injured in the long-simmering conflict between the two sides over decades.

Violence has been particularly heightened this year. The number of Palestinians – militants and civilians – killed in the occupied West Bank by Israeli forces is at its highest in nearly two decades. The same is true of Israelis and foreigners – most of them civilians – killed in Palestinian attacks.

Israel and Hamas have been involved in armed conflict dating back as early as the 1987 First Palestinian Intifada, or uprising, against Israel’s occupation of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

Israel captured Gaza from Egypt in a 1967 war, then withdrew in 2005. The territory, home to some 2 million Palestinians, fell under Hamas’ control in 2007 after a brief civil war with Fatah, a rival Palestinian faction that is the backbone of the Palestinian Authority.

After Hamas seized control of Gaza, Israel and Egypt imposed a strict siege on the territory, which is ongoing. Israel also maintains an air and naval blockade on Gaza.

Before Saturday’s operation, the last war between Hamas and Israel was in 2021, which lasted for 11 days and killed at least 250 people in Gaza and 13 in Israel.

Saturday’s assault occurred on the 50th anniversary of the 1973 war, when Israel’s Arab neighbors launched a surprise attack on Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, on October 6, 1973.

What is Hamas?

Hamas is an Islamist organization with a military wing that came into being in 1987, emerging out of the Muslim Brotherhood, a Sunni Islamist group that was founded in the late 1920s in Egypt.

The word “Hamas” is itself an acronym for “Harakat Al-Muqawama Al-Islamia” – Arabic for Islamic Resistance Movement. the group, like most Palestinian factions and political parties, insists that Israel is an occupying power and that it is trying to liberate the Palestinian territories. It considers Israel an illegitimate state.

Its refusal to recognize Israel is one reason why it has rejected peace talks in the past. In 1993, it opposed the Oslo Accords, a peace pact between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

The group presents itself as an alternative to the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has recognized Israel and has engaged in multiple failed peace initiatives with it. The PA is today led by Mahmoud Abbas and is based in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Hamas has over the years claimed many attacks on Israel and has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and Israel. Israel accuses its archenemy Iran of backing Hamas.

What is al-Aqsa?

The al-Aqsa compound is one of the most revered places in Islam and Judaism. The sacred grounds, known to Muslims as Al Haram Al Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) and to Jews as Temple Mount have been a flashpoint of tensions between Israel and the Palestinians for decades.

Hamas says it launched Saturday’s “Al-Aqsa Storm” attack in part to defend the holy site.

Only Muslims are allowed to pray in the compound under a status quo arrangement originally reached more than a century ago. Non-Muslim visitors are allowed visits at certain times and only to certain areas of the complex.

But many in the Muslims world fear that the right to be the sole worshipers there has been eroded and that the sites themselves are being threatened by a growing far-right Jewish movement and Israel’s far-right government.

Clashes have frequently broken out at the site between Palestinian worshipers and Israeli forces. Police raided the compound several times over the last year.

The complex lies in East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want as the capital of their future state and which most of the international community considers to be occupied territory. Israel captured it from Jordan in its six-day war in 1967 and considers both East and West Jerusalem as its united, “eternal capital.”

What are key regional players saying?

Western states condemned the Hamas attack and pledged support for Israel while Arab states, including those that have recognized Israel, called for calm.

United States President Joe Biden spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday and said that Washington “unequivocally condemns this appalling assault against Israel by Hamas terrorists from Gaza.”

“I made clear to Prime Minister Netanyahu that we stand ready to offer all appropriate means of support to the government and people of Israel,” he said.

Saudi Arabia, which is holding talks with the US to potentially normalize relations with Israel, said it is following closely the “unprecedented” situation and called on “both sides to immediately stop the escalation,” according to a statement by the Saudi foreign ministry on X.

Israel’s adversaries welcomed the attack. Major General Rahim Safavi, an adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said: “We congratulate the Palestinian fighters and will stand by their side until the liberation of Palestine and holy Jerusalem,” state-run ISNA said.

Hezbollah praised the assaults and said it is in contact with Palestinian militant groups “at home and abroad,” its Al Manar channel said.

What happens next?

The IDF is now focusing on taking control of the Gaza Strip.

“The significant thing that preoccupies us right now is the stabilization of control in the Gaza Strip,” Hecht told a briefing Sunday.

“We have targets for the next 12 hours: to end the Gaza enclave. To control the entire enclave and kill all the terrorists in our territory,” he said, adding that the IDF will try to evict certain communities in areas of Gaza.

Israel’s Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant has expanded the country’s “special security situation” to the entirety of Israel’s territory.

This enables the IDF to provide security instructions to civilians and to close public sites as needed for security, the minister’s office said. A “special security situation” area, within an 80-kilometer (48-mile) radius of the Gaza Strip, had been established earlier on Saturday.

Hecht said the IDF plans to put several potential next steps before the Israeli cabinet, which is meeting Sunday. The government is likely to take a decision on Sunday or Monday, he said.

Senior Hamas member Saleh al-Arouri told Al Jazeera Arabic Saturday that Hamas is ready “for all options, including a war and an escalation on all levels.”

“We are ready for the worst-case scenario, including a ground invasion, which will be the best for us to decide the ending of this battle,” al-Arouri said.

Israel has formally declared war on Hamas, setting the stage for a major military operation in Gaza as fighting continues to rage on Israeli soil.

Tanks and personnel carriers could be seen on the move near the Israel-Gaza border on Sunday, after Hamas – an Islamist militant group – launched an unprecedented and highly coordinated surprise assault this weekend that has so far killed over 700 Israelis.

Saturday was the deadliest day in decades for Israel and came after months of surging violence between Palestinians and Israelis, with the long-running conflict now heading into uncharted and dangerous new territory.

Questions remain over how the Israeli military and intelligence apparatus appeared to be caught off guard in one of the country’s worst security failures.

Hamas claims to be holding “over 100” Israeli hostages, including high-ranking officers, and continued to fire rockets into Israel throughout Sunday. Another Palestinian armed group, called Islamic Jihad, said on Sunday it is holding at least 30 hostages in Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed retaliation, warning his country would take “mighty vengeance” and was readying for “a long and difficult war.”

He urged Palestinians living in Gaza to “leave now.”

Over 400 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza as Israel responds with airstrikes in the densely-inhabited enclave.

Throughout the bloody weekend, Hamas launched thousands of rockets from the Gaza Strip into Israel – making direct hits on multiple locations inside the country including Tel Aviv – while armed terror groups entered Israel and infiltrated military bases, towns and farms, shooting at civilians and taking hostages.

Photos released by the Israeli foreign ministry showed dozens of bodies in the aftermath of a Hamas attack on a music festival near the Israel-Gaza border, which emergency responders said left at least 260 dead.

As Israeli forces clashed on the ground with Hamas fighters, Israeli airstrikes blasted what it said were Hamas-associated locations.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it had struck over 400 targets in the small enclave, including 10 towers that it said were used by Hamas and “a number of terrorist squads in the area surrounding the Gaza Strip.”

Palestinian authorities say 78 children are among the dead, and 2,300 others wounded.

According to Netanyahu, Israel’s “first phase” of retaliation has ended with the “destruction of the majority of the enemy forces that penetrated our territory.” It will be followed by an “offensive formation,” he said.

His government has decided to stop the supply of electricity, fuel and goods to Gaza.

Hamas has warned against measures in Gaza, alluding to hostages held in the area.

In a recorded audio message Saturday, Abu Obaida spokesman for the Al Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, said: “What happens to the people of the Gaza Strip will happen to them and beware of miscalculation.”

Civilians taken hostage include “not only soldiers but civilians, children, grandmothers,” Israeli Defense Forces spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht told a briefing on Sunday. “We have lost soldiers, we have lost commanders, we have lost a lot of civilians.”

It has been more than 17 years since an Israeli soldier was taken as a prisoner of war in an assault on Israeli territory. And Israel has not seen this kind of infiltration of military bases, towns and kibbutzim since town-by-town fighting in the 1948 war of independence.

On Sunday, Hecht, the IDF spokesman, said Israeli forces had neutralized most of the significant battles that took place in the settlement of Otef, but there are still ongoing operations in numerous other parts of the country.

The IDF’s goal for the next 12 hours is to “end the Gaza enclave … and kill all the terrorists in our territory,” he said.

The IDF is evacuating more than 20 communities adjacent to the Gaza security fence, and searching the area for any Hamas militants left. It is also seeking to control breaches in the fence.

Asked by a journalist about the intelligence failure that had allowed such a large scale attack to occur, Hecht said: “This is not a question for now … I am sure that will be a big discussion down the road.”

‘No warning of any kind’

The highly coordinated assault, which began Saturday morning, was unprecedented in its scale and scope and came on the 50th anniversary of the 1973 War in which Arab states blitzed Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

The number of rockets fired by Palestinian militants was at a scale “never seen before,” Halevy said, and this was “the first time” that Gaza has been able to “penetrate deep into Israel and to take control of villages.”

It is rare for Palestinian militants to be able to make it into Israel from Gaza which is sealed off and heavily watched by Israel’s military. Gaza is one of the most densely packed places in the world, an isolated coastal enclave of almost 2 million people crammed into 140 square miles.

Governed by Hamas, the territory is largely cut off from the rest of the world by an Israeli blockade of Gaza’s land, air and sea dating back to 2007. Egypt controls Gaza’s southern border crossing, Rafah. Israel has placed heavy restrictions on the freedom of civilian movement and controls the importation of basic goods into the narrow coastal strip.

Fighting between the two sides has surged in the last two years. The violence has been driven by frequent Israeli military raids in Palestinian towns and cities, which Israel has said are a necessary response to a rising number of attacks by Palestinian militants on Israelis.

They also come at a moment of deep division in Israel, months after the country’s right-wing government pushed through a contentious plan to reduce the power of the country’s courts, sparking a social, political and military crisis.

Western states condemned the Hamas attack on Saturday and pledged support for Israel while Arab states, including those that have recognized Israel, called for calm.

United States President Joe Biden spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday and said that Washington “unequivocally condemns this appalling assault against Israel by Hamas terrorists from Gaza.”

Saudi Arabia, which is holding talks with the US to potentially normalize relations with Israel, said it is following closely the “unprecedented” situation and called on “both sides to immediately stop the escalation,” according to a statement by the Saudi foreign ministry on X.

Pleas for release of hostages

Israelis are sharing photos of friends and family who they say have been kidnapped by Hamas militants, many of them women and children.

Then, over the phone, she heard the door break down.

“I heard terrorists speaking in Arabic to my teenagers. And the youngest saying to them ‘I’m too young to go,’” the mother said. “And the phone went off, the line went off. That was the last time I heard from them.”

Several people were taken hostage during an attack by Hamas militants on an Israeli music festival near the Israel-Gaza border. One video on social media showed an Israeli woman being kidnapped, hoisted onto the back of a motorcycle and driven away as her boyfriend was apprehended. Another clip pictured a German-Israeli woman who was taken from the festival being paraded around Gaza, unconscious and motionless.

Correction: This article has been updated to correct a reference to the Israeli political-security cabinet’s aim to degrade the capabilities of Hamas and other organizations in Gaza.

Fighting between Hamas and Israel raged into a third day Monday with militants launching a fresh barrage of rocket attacks and Israeli forces still battling to expel Hamas gunmen from its soil as jets continued to bombard the Palestinian enclave of Gaza.

Israel on Sunday formally declared war on the Islamist militant group Hamas after its fighters launched an unprecedented surprise assault this weekend into Israeli territory that has so far killed over 700 people in Israel, escalating a long-running conflict and leaving a nation reeling in anguish.

Hamas militants claimed late Sunday to be holding more than 100 hostages in Gaza, including high-ranking Israeli army officers, according to Mousa Abu Marzouk, chief deputy of Hamas’s Political Bureau.

Videos on social media showed militants capturing multiple civilians, including children, as Israeli families across the nation made anxious pleas for the safe return of their loved ones.

In addition to Israeli captives, there are also other nationalities believed to have been taken hostage, including American, Mexican, Brazilian and Thai nationals – further complicating Israel’s response to the Hamas attack.

And the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed early Monday local time that Israel is not in full control of its territory along the border with Gaza.

“Our troops are going door to door and house to house, looking for, and in many cases, engaging with last terrorists inside Israel.”

For now airstrikes have been the primary retaliation measure within Gaza itself with Israeli jets repeatedly pounding the heavily populated 140 square mile coastal strip, turning multiple buildings to rubble.

More than 430 Palestinians, including dozens of children, have been killed and nearly 2,300 wounded, according to authorities in Gaza.

The IDF says it has been hitting Hamas, destroying around 800 targets and killing “hundreds” of fighters, wounding thousands and capturing scores of others, spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said on Sunday.

Tens of thousands of people have been displaced in Gaza, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency said, and access to medical care has been complicated by Israel cutting power to the territory, threatening “lives of hundreds” of those injured, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said.

While the full scale of what the Israeli response will be remains unclear, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday predicted a “long and difficult war” and vowed “mighty vengeance” on Hamas.

Sounds of battle

The IDF said the priority for the coming hours and days was to “control the entire enclave and kill all the terrorists in our territory,” Hecht said.

Israeli fighters continued to clash with Hamas militants on Israeli soil early Monday morning in up to eight locations. Hecht said it was possible that more Hamas gunmen were still crossing into Israel from Gaza, and that areas Israel is targeting with airstrikes are points where militants were gathering to cross the border.

Israel’s declaration of war set the stage for a major military operation in Gaza and tanks and personnel carriers could be seen on the move near the Israel-Gaza border on Sunday.

Thousands of Israeli reservists have been called up and the IDF announced that several communities close to the Gaza security fence are being evacuated.

An Israeli military official and a United States defense official said Israel is requesting precision guided bombs and additional Iron Dome interceptors from the US, including Joint Direct Attack Munitions, or JDAMs – a kit that turns an unguided “dumb” bomb into a precision “smart” weapon.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the US will provide security assistance to Israel imminently. The US said it was also sending a Navy carrier strike group to the eastern Mediterranean Sea, including guided missile destroyers and guided missile cruisers.

Horror on the ground

Many Israelis have spent much of the past two days in bomb shelters and saferooms.

Throughout the bloody weekend, Hamas rockets made direct hits on multiple locations inside the country including Tel Aviv, while armed terror groups entered Israel and infiltrated military bases, towns and farms, shooting at civilians and taking hostages.

Among those killed in Israel are 12 Thai citizens, 10 Nepalis, four US nationals, two Ukrainians, one French and one British citizen.

Images and videos show the horror unfolding on the ground.

Photos released by the Israeli foreign ministry showed dozens of bodies in the aftermath of a Hamas attack on a music festival near the Israel-Gaza border, which emergency responders said left at least 260 dead.

“One couldn’t describe it with words. It’s impossible…It was a very difficult moment,” Yakov Argamani said, describing the moment he saw the video of his 25-year-old daughter Noa for the first time.

The IDF said Monday that Be’eri was “very badly hit,” and although most Hamas militants in the kibbutz have been killed, Israeli troops were still fighting there.

Attacks into southern Israel

Hamas claimed attacks in several parts of southern Israel on Sunday, including in Mavki’im, just north of Gaza, where it said its forces were still present and conducting operations.

Hamas militants also claimed to have launched “a major missile attack with 100 rockets” on the southern coastal city of Ashkelon, close to the Gaza border. Israeli police said a rocket attack made a “direct hit” on an apartment building there.

And in the southern Israeli city of Sderot, Hamas said it fired dozens of rockets in retaliation to the targeting of “homes” in Gaza by Israeli forces.

Israeli warplanes continued striking Gaza overnight Sunday into Monday and “severely degraded the capabilities” of Hamas, the IDF said. Among the targets was a structure that housed Hamas operatives and several Hamas command centers, including one belonging to a senior operative of the Hamas naval forces.

The barrage of Israeli strikes in Gaza have also inflicted casualties on civilians in what is one of the world’s most densely populated places.

At least 13 family members, including four toddlers, were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Khan Younis in southern Gaza Sunday, according to journalist Hassan Eslayeh and a family relative.

Regional concerns of escalation

The attacks come after months of surging violence between Palestinians and Israelis, with the long-running conflict now heading into uncharted and dangerous new territory. Questions remain over how the Israeli military and intelligence apparatus appeared to be caught off guard in one of the country’s worst security failures.

Hamas’ highly coordinated assault, which began Saturday morning, was unprecedented in its scale and scope and came on the 50th anniversary of the 1973 War in which Arab states blitzed Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

Fighting between the two sides has surged in the past two years. The violence has been driven by frequent Israeli military raids in Palestinian towns and cities, which Israel has said are a necessary response to a rising number of attacks by Palestinian militants on Israelis.

Concerns the conflict could spill out into the region were raised Sunday when Lebanese group Hezbollah claimed responsibility for targeting three Israeli sites in an area known as Shebaa Farms, using missiles and artillery. The area is considered by Lebanon as Israeli-occupied.

The IDF said its artillery struck the area in Lebanon where the firing originated and said it “will continue to operate in all regions and at any time necessary to ensure the safety of the Israeli civilians.”

On Sunday, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting but no action was taken afterward. The Deputy US Ambassador to the UN said “not all” the member nations had condemned Hamas’ attacks, but did not specify which. All 15 members need to vote unanimously for the UNSC to release a statement.

When the Palestinian militant group Hamas launched an attack on Israel Saturday morning, Palestinians living in the besieged strip had mixed feelings.

Some celebrated, taking pride in what they perceived as a victory against Israel. Others, however, were afraid, dreading a deadly retaliation.

The militant group’s unprecedented incursion prompted vows of retribution from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who declared on Saturday that his country was at war, pledging a “mighty vengeance for this black day.”

Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said Sunday that Israel destroyed around 800 targets in Gaza, including what he described as launching pads used by Hamas.

At least 413 Palestinians have been killed, including 78 children, the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza said.

No strangers to war with Israel, many Gazans are sheltering in their homes, with the vast majority lacking access to bunkers. The territory is one of the most densely populated places on earth, where some 2 million people live in an area of 140 square miles.

Those who venture out do so only to complete essential errands, or to look for their missing in the carnage of Israeli strikes. The streets are damaged and covered with rubble, and the air smells of dust and gunpowder.

Hussein said he did not know why the tower was struck. He had moved in with his family just five months ago.

Following Hamas’ incursion, Palestinians were also barred from leaving Gaza through Erez crossing, which has become the site of a battle between Hamas and Israeli forces.

Netanyahu declared Saturday that Israel will be stopping the supply of “electricity, fuel and goods” into the Gaza Strip, although IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Richard Hecht said Sunday only electricity had been cut. Since then, power is only available for an average of four hours per day, down from the usual eight hours. Israel supplies the majority of Gaza’s electricity.

Internet connectivity has also been choppy.

‘Panic and fear’

The Gaza Strip has been almost completely cut off from the rest of the world for nearly 17 years.

Governed by Hamas since 2007, the enclave is under strict siege by Egypt and Israel, which also maintains an air and naval blockade on Gaza. It has been described by Human Rights Watch as the “world’s largest open-air prison.”

Gazans have seen Israeli strikes ravage the strip on several occasions since Israeli forces withdrew from the territory in 2005. Fighting regularly takes place between Israel and Palestinian factions in Gaza, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

Overnight, Israel struck down at least 10 towers in Gaza that it said were used by Hamas, Hagari said Sunday, adding that tens of thousands of Israeli soldiers are operating on the ground around the Gaza Strip.

The IDF on Sunday said it is now focusing on taking control of the Gaza Strip, and urged civilians there to leave residential areas near the border immediately for their safety as Israeli military operations continued to target Hamas.

But most Gazans have no way of fleeing the besieged enclave. All crossings out of the territory are shut, with the exception of the tightly controlled Rafah crossing with Egypt.

Hani El-Bawab, 75, said he and his family of four had been up all night, fearing airstrikes. The tower adjacent to his home was hit by Israel overnight, collapsing onto his own house and rendering him and his family homeless.

“I don’t know what to do,” El-Bawab said. He now lives on the street, while his wife stays with an acquaintance.

Nevertheless, he doesn’t regret Hamas’ attack on Israel. “Every time, they (Israel) are the ones who attack us,” he said. “This time, the (fighters) are the ones who went in.”

One video from the kibbutz of Be’eri in southern Israel showed armed fighters with burned cars and a bulldozer in the background. Toward the end of the video, which was released on a Hamas-affiliated Telegram channel, four bodies can be seen on the ground.

It is not clear what happened to the fifth hostage.

Be’eri lies just three miles from the eastern border of Gaza.

Alongside other towns and settlements close to Gaza such as Ofakim, Sderot, Yad Mordechai, Kfar Aza, Yated and Kissufim, it was among the first to be targeted by Hamas fighters as they launched Saturday morning’s unprecedented and carefully coordinated killing and hostage-taking spree.

The community of Be’eri was “very badly hit,” Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Lt. Col. Richard Hecht said Monday during a briefing, more than 48 hours after Hamas launched the surprise attack.

Hecht said most Hamas militants in Be’eri had been killed, but Israeli troops were still there attempting to clear the area of any remaining fighters.

“We are still fighting. We thought this morning we would be in a better place,” Hecht said.

As many as 1,000 Hamas fighters breached the border from Gaza, according to Israeli authorities, in an attack that has killed more than 700 Israelis, prompting retaliatory Israeli airstrikes and a formal declaration of war on Sunday.

More than 400 Palestinians have been killed, including 78 children, according to the health ministry in Gaza, and medical care has been complicated by Israel cutting power to the territory.

Hamas militants have taken more than 100 Israelis hostage, including high-ranking army officers, a spokesperson for the group claimed Sunday. It’s believed they are in Gaza but their fate is unknown.

Israel authorities have said that dozens of Israelis are being held hostage in Gaza but have not confirmed exact numbers. In addition to Israeli captives, several other nationalities are believed to have been taken hostage.

Hecht said it was possible that Hamas fighters were still crossing into Israel from Gaza, adding that four fighting divisions had been deployed in the south.

He said around 20 breach points had been totally secured but other points were more vulnerable.

“There are some areas where we are still holding on with tanks and air cover. I can’t deny the fact that there are still people coming in … It’s an ongoing fight,” he said.

International aid groups in Afghanistan are scrambling to send help to survivors of this weekend’s earthquake in the west of the country which left more than 2,000 people dead and many more injured in a war-ravaged nation already stricken by an economic crisis.

The 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck on Saturday 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of Herat city in the western Herat province – the third largest in Afghanistan. It was one of the deadliest quakes to hit Afghanistan in years.

Images showed massive heaps of debris and rubble after buildings collapsed. Crowds of survivors were also seen gathered in the streets for safety.

“The situation is worse than we imagined with people in devastated villages still desperately trying to rescue survivors from under the rubble with their bare hands,” said Thamindri de Silva, national director at World Vision Afghanistan.

Reinforcements from the capital Kabul had arrived to help, de Silva added, “but there was only one hospital and it was at full stretch with serious cases being transferred to other private facilities in the city.”

“Our colleagues and their families are processing this devastation in their hometowns and yet we are responding with everything we have,” de Silva said. “People need urgent medical care, water, food, shelter and help to stay safe.”

Funding from the international community, he added, “has been inadequate.”

“Organizations like ours are able to provide relief and help recovery but without commitment from international governments and donors, more will fall into humanitarian need, displacement will increase and lives will be lost. The world must not look away now.”

UN agencies and partners are continuing to mount emergency operations and deploying more teams to join ongoing humanitarian efforts, spokesperson for the UN Secretary-General Stéphane Dujarric said.

“We are coordinating with the de facto authorities to swiftly assess needs and provide emergency assistance,” Dujarric said.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Sunday expressed solidarity and called on the international community to “come together and support Afghans impacted by the earthquake – many of whom were already in need before this crisis,” he added.

UNICEF, the UN’s children’s fund, has dispatched 10,000 hygiene kits, 5,000 family kits, 1,500 sets of winter clothes and blankets, 1,000 tarpaulins, and basic household items to ongoing humanitarian efforts.

Teams are also conducting additional assessments on the ground and are providing emergency drugs and tents for overburdened health clinics.

“We will make every effort to bring quick relief to those affected,” said Fran Equiza, its representative in Afghanistan.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid on Sunday put the number killed at 2,053 people, with more 1,240 people hurt and 1,320 houses completely or partially destroyed. But there are fears the toll could rise further.

Afghanistan has long been one of Asia’s poorest countries and has been ravaged by conflict for decades.

The Taliban seized power in August 2021, 20 years after their ouster by US troops – an event that saw many major aid groups and NGOs pull out and crucial aid programs halted.

The Taliban’s takeover further isolated Afghanistan from the rest of the world and led to Washington and allies cutting off international funding – crippling an economy already heavily dependent on aid.

The country continues to suffer significant damage from regular earthquakes.

A 5.9 magnitude earthquake last June in the eastern Paktika and Khost provinces bordering Pakistan, killed more than a thousand people.

Last week the World Bank warned that two thirds of Afghan families currently faced “significant challenges in maintaining their livelihoods” – making it harder for Afghans to recover from earthquakes, which have been regularly occuring in the country.

International aid groups have said their ability to respond to calls during major disasters was heavily hampered by the Taliban’s takeover and called for more urgent global aid but only a handful of countries have publicly offered support.

Neighboring China in a statement issued on Sunday by its foreign ministry said that it would do “its best to assist in Afghanistan’s disaster-relief efforts in light of its needs.”

Dozens of people are believed to have been captured in Israel by Hamas fighters over the weekend. They are now being held in locations across Gaza, complicating Israel’s response to the militant group’s deadly attack on Saturday.

Israel is taking pains to establish the exact number of hostages that have been taken into Gaza, an isolated coastal enclave of almost 2 million people crammed into 140 square miles, one of the most densely populated places in the world.

In addition to Israeli captives, there are several other nationalities believed to be taken hostage. Two Mexican nationals, a woman and a man, have “presumably” been taken hostage by Hamas, Mexico’s Foreign Minister Alicia Barcena said on Sunday. At least three Brazilian nationals are also missing, according Brazilian authorities.

Al Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, has warned that Israeli attacks in the area could impact hostages, with its spokesman, Abu Obaida, saying in a recorded audio message Saturday that they were “present in all axes in the Gaza Strip.”

It has been more than 17 years since an Israeli soldier was taken as a prisoner of war in an assault on Israeli territory. And Israel has not seen this kind of infiltration of military bases, towns and kibbutzim since town-by-town fighting in the 1948 war of independence.

Here’s what we know about some of the hostages taken by Hamas.

Music festival

Hundreds of attendees at the Nova music festival ran across the plains of the Negev Desert near Urim, a community close to the Gaza Strip, trying to escape Hamas gunmen pursuing them in vehicles in a terrifying chase. Some were killed and others were seized by armed captors, social media videos showed.

Details of hostages from the attack are beginning to emerge as family members recognize relatives in the clips circulating online.

Her cousin confirmed to the Washington Post that Louk attended the music festival.

“We recognized her by the tattoos, and she has long dreadlocks,” Louk’s cousin told the Washington Post. “We have some kind of hope… Hamas is responsible for her and the others.”

Israeli border communities

Hamas fighters took hostages in the border community Be’eri, and the town of Ofakim, 20 miles east of Gaza, IDF spokesman Brig. Gen. Daniel Hagari said on Saturday, adding that the two locations were the “main focal points” of the unfolding crisis.

In a televised address, he said that there were special forces with senior commanders in the two communities, and fighting was ongoing in 22 locations.

Residents in Be’eri and another community on Israel’s border with Gaza, Nir Oz, told the country’s Channel 12 television station that assailants were going door to door, trying to break into their homes.

Channel 12 also reported that infiltrators had taken hostages in Netiv HaAsara. Israeli authorities did not immediately confirm any details about those reports.

“I don’t even know what the situation is regarding the hostages, and the situation is not looking good,” Yoni Asher said, adding that he tracked his wife’s phone and learned that it was located in Gaza.

Soldiers

Al Qassam Brigades claimed to capture “dozens” of Israeli soldiers on Saturday.

“We bring good news to our (Palestinian) prisoners and our people that the al Qassam Brigades have dozens of captured (Israeli) officers and soldiers in their hands,” the group’s spokesman Abu Obaida said in a post on Telegram. “They have been secured in safe places and resistance tunnels.”

The video, posted to Hamas’ official social media accounts, shows militants yank two clearly terrified and stunned soldiers out of a disabled tank. It’s unclear from the video how the tank was disabled, but Hamas has used drones to drop bombs onto Israeli tanks before.

One of the soldiers is then seen in a short snippet of video being kicked on the ground by the militants. In the next clip, the soldier is seen lying motionless on the ground.

A second video, taken afterward, shows a number of different armed men around the tank. The three soldiers are nowhere to be seen.

The armed men are then seen pulling a fourth Israeli soldier from the tank. The soldier is motionless as he’s dragged down the side of the tank and onto the ground. The armed men are seen stomping on his body.

The terrifying attack was just one of multiple locations hit on Saturday morning by the most sustained and coordinated assault inside Israel ever carried out by Hamas militants.

At least 260 bodies would later be found at the festival site, according to Israeli rescue service Zaka. Some attendees were taken hostage, seen in social media videos being seized by their armed captors.

The outdoor Nova Festival event in a rural farmland area near the Gaza-Israel border was supposed to be an all-night dance party, celebrating the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. But as dawn broke, Gibly said they began hearing sirens and rockets.

Explosions can be heard in video taken by Gibly of her and friends walking through the quickly emptying concert grounds, roughly two miles from the border.

“Ima’le,” someone is heard saying, a common Israeli expression of fear or feeling startled.

Gibly and the others didn’t know it, but less than two miles away, Gaza militants had also begun attacking Israeli tanks and soldiers.

When attendees fled in their cars, Gibly said the roadways became clogged and no one could move. That’s when the gunshots began, she says.

In videos Gibly took, an Israeli military vehicle is seen driving against the flow of traffic as people try to make way for it. Someone outside the car be heard screaming: “Go! Go forward! Go forward!”

That’s when Gibly said she and her friends panicked, abandoned the car, and began running.

‘Like a shooting range’

A video circulating on social media showed hundreds of attendees fleeing their cars, running across an empty field with gunshots echoing in the background.

“It was so terrifying and we didn’t know where to drive to not meet those evil … people,” she said. “I have a lot of friends that got lost at the forest for a lot of hours and got shot like it was a range.”

Gibly is still trying to get in touch with her friends who were also at the concert. She says she doesn’t know if others survived, were taken prisoner, or worse.

The festival’s organizers are helping Israeli security forces locate missing attendees.

Hostage taken to Gaza

Details of hostages from the attack are beginning to emerge as family members recognize relatives in videos circulating from Gaza.

In one video that went viral, an Israeli woman and her boyfriend – identified as Noa Argamani and Avinatan Or, who had attended the festival – were shown being kidnapped.

In it, Argamani was seen on the back of a motorcycle being driven away as she pleaded for help. Or was seen nearby as the motorcycle carrying Argamani rode past, and was eventually apprehended by several men – and made to walk with his hands held behind his back.

Family members and friends of the couple have expressed that they want the video to be widely shared in hopes of locating them and securing their safe release.

“But still, we have people missing. We have friends and families, young and old, everyone that got to Gaza Strip, and we need to do everything and now to get them back,” he said.

“I saw his girlfriend Noa in the video, scared and frightened, I can’t imagine what’s going through her at all – screaming in panic on a motorcycle, when some scumbags are holding her and they don’t let her go,” he said.

“My brother, who is a big guy, two meters tall, trains four times a week, a really strong guy. They held him maybe four or five people and just led them towards the strip, I guess.”

Her cousin confirmed to the Washington Post that Louk attended the music festival.

In the video, Louk is seen motionless. One gunman, carrying a rocket propelled grenade, has his leg draped over her waist; the other holds a clump of her dreadlocks. “Allahu Akbar,” they cheer – meaning “God is great” in Arabic.

Some of the crowd gathered around the truck join in the cheers. One man spits on Louk’s head as the car drives off.

“We recognized her by the tattoos, and she has long dreadlocks,” Louk’s cousin told the Washington Post. “We have some kind of hope … Hamas is responsible for her and the others.”

In a video obtained by German news outlet Bild, Louk’s mother Ricarda said: “This morning my daughter, Shani Nicole Louk, a German citizen, was kidnapped with a group of tourists in southern Israel by Palestinian Hamas.”

“We were sent a video in which I could clearly see our daughter unconscious in the car with the Palestinians and them driving around the Gaza Strip,” she said. “I ask you to send us any help or any news. Thank you very much.”