On
Saturday, gunmen from the Palestinian organization Hamas rampaged through
Israeli cities, killing and arresting a large number of citizens and soldiers
in a surprise attack. Israel responded with a huge air campaign that killed a
large number of people in the Gaza Strip.
A
war that both sides pledged to intensify was sparked by the biggest attack on
Israel in decades. Gunbattles that erupted in more than 20 different sites
throughout Israel are said to have left at least 200 Israelis dead and 1,100
injured. Health officials in Gaza reported 1,600 injured and over 230
fatalities.
"Our
enemy will pay a price the type of which it has never known," Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said. "We are in a war and we will win
it".
Hamas
leader Ismail Haniyeh said the assault that had begun in Gaza would spread to
the West Bank and Jerusalem.
"This
was the morning of defeat and humiliation upon our enemy, its soldiers and its
settlers," he said in a speech. "What happened reveals the greatness
of our preparation. What happened today reveals the weakness of the
enemy."
Israeli
civilians' bodies were scattered on a highway in Sderot, southern Israel, close
to Gaza, and were encircled by shattered glass. On the front seats of an
automobile, a dead man and lady were lying. Behind another automobile, where
two dead lay in a pool of blood, a military vehicle passed by.
"I
stepped outside and saw a lot of terrorist, civilian, and automobile bodies. A
sea of bodies, down the road in Sderot, and in other locations, stated Shlomi
from Sderot.
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