It is the nature of the news cycle that huge things get passed over.
But what happened just over a month ago in Israel should not be passed over.
The scale and catastrophe of what happened is still becoming clear.
Yet the world seems to have passed on.
Already the international media is focused not on the atrocities Hamas committed against Israel but on the response of Israel to the terrorists of Hamas.
Every day the New York Times and other papers give their views on how Israel should bring the war to a draw.
And every day there are protests across the world made up of people who are either evil or ignorant.
That some of the anti-Israel protestors are ignorant is provable.
Two girls interviewed at one pro-Hamas protest in London were asked what their reaction was when they first learned that Hamas had attacked Israel on 7th October.
“I don’t believe they did, did they,” said one.
“Honestly, I think I need to be a bit more clued up on everything that’s going on, so I feel I’m not really qualified to answer that too well,” said the other.
Well she seemed to feel “qualified” enough to turn up to an anti-Israel demo.
Her friend, holding a banner, actually said, “I mean, I’m not sure I’ve seen anything that shows that that’s actually happened.”
These two ignoramuses should have come to Israel with me this week.
Specifically they should have come to the site of the music festival massacre, and seen the remains of that “peace rave” where people their age, and very similar to them, were gunned down and raped just as the party was “coming up.”
Or perhaps they should have come with me to the small community of Nir Oz on the borders of Gaza.
I have been to “kibbutz” like this many times in the past. The citizens of these small towns and communities are often very left-wing. Often “peaceniks.” They have been used to rockets for years.
Ever since Israel withdrew from the Gaza in 2005 and Hamas got elected and killed their rivals, the people of these communities have known that their neighbors might not love them.
But few could have imagined the sheer human hate and evil that came down on their community one Saturday morning last month.
Nir Oz is — or was — a community of 400 people. Today it is an empty ghost-town.
Sitting within sight of the Gaza border the terrorists came in from four different entrances on October 7th and moved house to house.
One of the surviving members of the community took me around. We moved carefully through the burned out ruins of his town.
He knew the families who had lived in every one of these houses. He knew their names, their stories, their hobbies.
It was a scene of utter carnage. Of the community’s 400 people, at least 30 were murdered in their homes and over 80 were kidnapped and taken into Gaza, many very badly wounded.
Most of the modest houses had a safe room built into them in which the families could shelter from the regular rockets fired at them from Gaza. But these was not enough on the morning of 7th October.
In house after house I saw the results. Each was left as it was left that day. Many were burned out.
Tables were overthrown and belongings strewn everywhere. In some of the houses the blood-stains spoke for themselves.
The safe-rooms didn’t lock, because nobody expected such a batallion-style invasion of terrorists.
As a result the residents of Nir Oz met their ends in their “safe-rooms,” trying to hold the handles firm as the terrorists of Hamas tried to open them from the other side. The bullet holes around the handles told the story in most houses.
An elderly woman struggling to keep the door closed, shot repeatedly from the other side of the door before the terrorists burst in and finished her off.
One old man who had not been able to get out was burned alive by the terrorists in his home. “He always said he had the best view,” my guide said, as we stood on this dead man’s balcony overlooking Gaza.
Worst was when we came to the home of my guide’s sister. She had been out of the house when the terrorists came in.
Her two teenage sons barricaded themselves into the safe-room. Surrounded by their toys and magazines, you could see all the signs of the struggle these brave young lads put up.
But the terrorists broke in, wounded them and stole them — taking them into the Gaza.
Then there were the Thai workers who helped in the Kibbutz and had their own accommodation. The terrorists had gone door to door shooting them.
As in so many other places in the settlements you could see the stains on the floor where someone had crawled during their last moments or been dragged out half dead. At the end of this row of accommodation was their bomb shelter.
It was plain from the inside that this was the sight of a massacre.
Hamas packed the Thai men and women into this small room and then butchered them. The floor was still thick with their congealed blood.
And here it looked like Hamas had tried to save their bullets. For the walls and ceiling — even the air-conditioning unit — were all covered in blood spatter.
Here, like so many other parts of the community, there were occasional hand-prints in blood, where people had tried to stand or avoid being dragged in their dying moments.
These imprints should not be forgotten. These were all people who had done nothing wrong.
They were to a man, woman and child all just going about their lives.
Most had some dream of peace. Some houses still had their shopping lists on their fridge doors. Others had signs saying “Live and let live.”
Hamas didn’t allow them to live. The world must never forget this.
Israel cannot live with Hamas. The world must realize this.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
