Nir Oz attack

On 7 October 2023, as part of the surprise attack on Israel, Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip, led by Hamas, invaded the Nir Oz kibbutz in southern Israel. They killed scores of kibbutz residents, burned homes, and abducted civilians. Over 500 Palestinian militants and civilian looters participated in the massacre. A total of 47 people were killed and 76 were taken hostage in the attack.

The Nir Oz (Hebrew: נִיר עֹז, ניר עוז), is a kibbutz in southern Israel between Magen and Nirim and was founded on 1 October 1955 as the Nahal settlement. Due to its proximity to the Gaza Strip, the kibbutz has seen constant attacks from the Gaza Strip, and in a 2023 book it was reported that the kibbutz had a number of "self-contained bomb shelters, each weighing 67 tons". Nir Oz is a kibbutz located in the Gaza envelope, less than 7 kilometers from the border with the Gaza Strip. On 6 October, before the attack, Nir Oz had 427 residents.

The attack on Israel started at around 6:29 a.m. Israel Summer Time (UTC+3) with a widespread rocket barrage, resulting in many kibbutz residents being in their safe rooms as the attack began. Of the kibbutz's population of around 420 residents, 386 were present during the attack. Some survivors of the Psyduck music festival massacre also sought refuge in the kibbutz.

Under the cover of the rocket barrage, Hamas militants breached the border in numerous areas and invaded Israel. Six of the breaches were in the Nir Oz area, through which fighters from Hamas' Nukhba unit entered, followed later by other Hamas militants, militants from Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Mujahideen Brigades, and unaffiliated Palestinians. At the time the Israel Defense Forces had 182 combat troops and 57 combat support troops defending Nir Oz and several nearby communities. The IDF bases in the area came under attack during the onslaught and the IDF's command and control in the area initially collapsed.

With the start of heavy rocket fire and Hamas militants spotted approaching the border, two tanks and an armored personnel carrier from a nearby military outpost had positioned themselves along the border close to Nir Oz and Nirim, with one tank south of Nir Oz, the other north of it, and the APC between them. The tank to the south was disabled after being hit by five anti-tank missiles. Three of its crew were killed and another crewman was captured: the bodies and living crewman were taken to Gaza. Footage of this incident circulating online resulted in the tank becoming an attraction for Palestinians during the attack, with hundreds from Khuza'a subsequently reaching the area and many proceeding further into Israel towards Nir Oz from there. This, along with the lack of IDF troops defending the kibbutz giving the invaders a sense of freedom, would result in an unusually large number of attackers invading Nir Oz compared to other communities attacked on 7 October according to the IDF investigation. An estimated 500 Palestinians participated in the attack on Nir Oz, outnumbering the population of the kibbutz. They included civilians who entered alongside fighters, among them children and at least one man in his 60s.

Hamas fighters took out military surveillance cameras on the border close to Nir Oz with sniper rifles at 6:38 a.m. Only one camera, located next to the kibbutz further from the border, continued to function. At 6:42 a.m., Colonel Asaf Hamami, the commander of the Gaza Division's Southern Brigade, alerted the local community security teams in the area. He would later be killed defending Nirim. The kibbutz security team was activated by the security coordinator at 6:43 a.m. At 6:49 a.m., a car carrying two partygoers fleeing the Psyduck festival massacre entered the kibbutz through its main gate, evading the first militants to enter the kibbutz, who arrived 10 seconds later.

At 6:52 a.m., a member of the kibbutz security team exchanged fire with the militants while other members attempted to assist. At 6:55 a.m., another vehicle with fleeing partygoers from the Psyduck music festival was fired on by militants at the entrance to the kibbutz, killing two. At 6:57 a.m., Hamas militants carried out the first murder inside the kibbutz, killing 74 year old Bracha Levinson in her home while livestreaming the murder on her Facebook page. Between 7:11 a.m. and 7:18 a.m., another two vehicles with partygoers fleeing the Psyduck festival arrived at the entrance to Nir Oz, where waiting militants murdered the partygoers. At 7:27 a.m., militants entered Nir Oz through a southern entrance and proceeded to the foreign workers' residences, killing twelve foreign nationals and kidnapping five. The militants continued their rampage in the kibbutz, killing residents in their homes and setting buildings on fire. They began taking hostages at around 8:30 a.m.

The kibbutz security team and other armed kibbutz members attempted to fight off the attack, yet were outnumbered by the amount of Hamas and other militants that had entered the kibbutz. The majority of the kibbutz's security team were killed or taken hostage while attempting to defend the kibbutz. Some security team members and other armed civilians fought from their homes. One member of the security team, Eran Smilansky, shot two militants who entered his home, then fired at a group of six militants gathered nearby and observed them falling. Another armed resident, Yaron Maor, a veteran of the IDF's Givati Brigade, also shot two militants who entered his house and additional ones nearby. The kibbutz security coordinator attempted and failed to link up with an IDF force, and then launched a solo assault. He was wounded but managed to extract himself to his home's safe room, and struggled to communicate in the following hours due to poor reception. Four members of the security team formed an expanded group with three other armed residents and made a stand against the militants, managing to delay some abductions and killings for about two hours, but were overwhelmed and eventually defeated at around 9:00 a.m., with organized resistance coming to an end after that and abductions subsequently ramping up. Afterwards some armed kibbutz members continued to resist individually. Four kibbutz defenders were killed: two members of the security team and two other residents posthumously recognized as members of the security team. The IDF investigation concluded that the security team fought bravely but that even a larger team would not have stood a chance against the sheer number of militants in the kibbutz without backup from the military.