“I Can’t Erase All the Blood from My Mind”

National and international media outlets detailed many of the atrocities that took place on October 7. Some reports minimized the extent of the abuses, while others included allegations of abuses that were later proven incorrect.

Hamas, the Palestinian movement that has governed the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip since 2007, stated that its armed wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades (the “Qassam Brigades”), led the assault on October 7. Survivor accounts and publicly available digital material from that day show that many of the fighters wore a combination of black or green uniforms or camouflage, some of which resembled Israeli military uniforms. Some wore distinctive headbands or insignia that identified them as members of Hamas or another armed group. Other armed group members wore civilian attire, although some may have been civilians from Gaza who joined the assault.

Most of the victims of the attacks were Jewish Israelis. However, fighters also killed, wounded, or took hostage Israeli dual nationals, Palestinian citizens of Israel, Palestinians from Gaza, and foreign workers, including Chinese, Filipino, Nepali, Sri Lankan and Thai nationals, and at least one national each from Cambodia, Canada, Eritrea, Germany, Mexico, Sudan, Tanzania, and the United Kingdom.

This report aims to capture the nature and extent of violations of international humanitarian law, known as the laws of war, and serious international crimes committed by Palestinian armed groups across numerous attack sites on October 7. The report also examines the role of different Palestinian armed groups involved, and their coordination before and during the attacks.

Methodology

Human Rights Watch conducted research in October and November 2023 in Israel, and remote research through June 2024. The research included interviews in person and remotely with 144 people including: 94 survivors of the October 7 attacks; family members of survivors, hostages and those killed; first responders who collected human remains from the attack sites; medical experts who examined the human remains and provided forensic advice to the Israeli authorities; officials from the municipalities affected by the attacks; journalists who visited the attack sites after Israeli forces secured the areas; analysts of Palestinian political and armed groups; and international investigators. Human Rights Watch verified over 280 photographs and videos posted on social media platforms or shared directly with Human Rights Watch, including those recorded by fighters’ body cameras, cellphone cameras, dashboard cameras, and closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras from the attack sites. Human Rights Watch also examined satellite images and analyzed dozens of audio recordings, most shared on armed groups’ Telegram channels.

Violations of International Humanitarian Law

This report details numerous incidents of violations of international humanitarian law—the laws of war—by Palestinian armed groups on October 7, 2023; it does not include violations since then. These include deliberate and indiscriminate attacks against civilians and civilian objects; willful killing of persons in custody; cruel and other inhumane treatment; sexual and gender-based violence; hostage taking; mutilation and despoiling (robbing) of bodies; use of human shields; and pillage and looting.

International humanitarian law recognizes the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza as an ongoing armed conflict. The hostilities between Israel and Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups are governed by international humanitarian law for non-international armed conflicts, which are rooted in international treaty law, most notably Common Article 3 to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, and customary international humanitarian law. These rules concern the methods and means of combat and fundamental protections for civilians and for combatants no longer participating in hostilities and apply to both states and non-state armed groups.

The foremost principle of international humanitarian law is that parties to a conflict must distinguish at all times between combatants and civilians. Civilians may never be the target of attack. Attacks that deliberately target civilians or fail to discriminate between combatants and civilians, or that would cause disproportionate harm to the civilian population compared to the anticipated military gain, are prohibited.

Members of the organized fighting forces of a non-state party may be targeted during an armed conflict. There is no requirement that members of non-state armed groups wear uniforms or other identifying insignia.

Common Article 3 provides a number of fundamental protections for civilians and captured or incapacitated combatants. Violence against such persons—notably murder, cruel treatment, and torture—is prohibited, as well as outrages against their personal dignity and degrading or humiliating treatment, and the taking of hostages.

War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity

Serious violations of the laws of war that are committed with criminal intent—deliberately or recklessly—are war crimes. War crimes, listed in the “grave breaches” provisions of the Geneva Conventions and as customary law, include a wide array of offenses, including deliberate, indiscriminate, and disproportionate attacks harming civilians and civilian objects, torture and other ill-treatment, hostage-taking, and using human shields, among others. Individuals also may be held criminally liable for attempting to commit a war crime, as well as assisting in, facilitating, aiding, or abetting a war crime.

Certain crimes, such as murder, can amount to crimes against humanity, when committed as part of a “widespread or systematic attack directed against a civilian population.” The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) defines such an “attack” as a course of conduct involving the multiple commission of acts listed as crimes against humanity, pursuant to or in furtherance of state or organizational policy to commit such an “attack”—that is, the multiple criminal acts committed. Such a policy includes the state or organization actively promoting or encouraging such an attack, or in certain situations, its deliberate failure to take action.

Criminal responsibility may fall on persons responsible for war crimes or crimes against humanity, including those planning or instigating or assisting the commission of the crimes. In addition, commanders and civilian leaders may be prosecuted for war crimes or crimes against humanity as a matter of command responsibility when they knew or should have known about the commission of war crimes or crimes against humanity by persons within their chain of command and took insufficient measures to prevent them or punish those responsible.

States have an obligation to investigate and fairly prosecute individuals within their territory implicated in war crimes or crimes against humanity.

Violations on October 7

Violations of International Humanitarian Law and War Crimes

Killings

The laws of war prohibit deliberate or indiscriminate attacks on civilians and the killing of civilians or captured combatants in custody, which are war crimes.

Palestinian fighters repeatedly attacked civilians and summarily executed individuals in their custody. The killings of civilians appear planned because of the many similarities in how killings took place across the attack sites: the armed groups directed many of their attacks at residential areas, fighters began to shoot civilians immediately after the assault began at 6:30 a.m., and the armed groups’ audio recordings and videos of the assault posted on their Telegram channels were indicative of a modus operandi. The Hamas leadership issued some statements after the assault saying its fighters had been instructed to spare women, children and older people, something contradicted by events. Some statements also made no mention of men who, if civilians, are also protected from attack.

Fighters also often extensively damaged people’s property, including by smashing and vandalizing, as well as by burning some buildings to the ground, putting civilians inside at grave risk.

Torture and Ill-treatment

Palestinian fighters committed acts of torture and ill-treatment against individuals they had captured, including those being taken as hostages. Committing torture and other ill-treatment is a violation of the laws of war and a war crime.

Crimes Involving Acts of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

Rape and other severe forms of sexual violence are crimes under international law. Acts of sexual and gender-based violence may also constitute the war crime of outrages upon personal dignity. Human Rights Watch found evidence of acts of sexual and gender-based violence by fighters including forced nudity, and the posting without consent of sexualized images on social media. Human Rights Watch was not able to gather verifiable information through interviews with survivors of or witnesses to rape during the assault on October 7. Human Rights Watch requested access to information on sexual and gender-based violence in the possession of the Israeli government, but this request was not granted.

Taking of Hostages

Hostage-taking has been defined by the International Committee of the Red Cross as “the seizure, detention or otherwise holding of a person (the hostage) accompanied by the threat to kill, injure or continue to detain that person in order to compel a third party to do or to abstain from doing any act as an explicit or implicit condition for the release, safety or well-being of the hostage.” Hostages can include civilians and captured military personnel. Hostage-taking is a violation of the laws of war and a war crime.

The Hamas leadership has said that taking hostages was core to their assault plans. The Qassam Brigades and other armed groups took 251 people hostage on October 7, including 40 who were taken from the Supernova Music Festival, and 39 children. As of July 1, 116 hostages were still in Gaza, at least 42 of them dead.

The Qassam Brigades and other armed groups have released multiple videos showing hostages asking to be released and demanding action from the Israeli government to secure their release. The broadcast of these videos of people in captivity are forms of inhumane treatment that constitute the war crime of “outrages upon personal dignity.”

Pillage, Looting and Destruction of Property

Pillage has been defined as the forcible taking of private property. Pillage, as well as destruction of property without military justification, are war crimes.

Palestinian fighters and unarmed people, some of whom may have been civilians from Gaza, stole from homes during the October 7 assault. In some cases, they demanded money and other possessions from civilians sheltering inside their houses.

Crimes Against Humanity

Human Rights Watch has found that the Palestinian armed groups involved in the assault on October 7 committed a widespread attack directed against a civilian population, according to the definition required for crimes against humanity. This is based on the numerous civilian sites that were targeted for the commission of crimes. The attack directed against the civilian population was also systematic, based on the planning that went into the crimes. Human Rights Watch has further found that the criminal acts of the killing of civilians and the taking of hostages were all central aims of the planned attack, and not actions that occurred as an afterthought, or as a plan gone awry, or as isolated acts, for example solely by the actions of unaffiliated Palestinians from Gaza, and as such there is strong evidence of an organizational policy to commit multiple acts of crimes against humanity.

Given, therefore that on October 7, 2023, there was an attack directed against a civilian population and that the murder of civilians and the taking of hostages—imprisonment in violation of fundamental rules of international law—were part of it, these amount to crimes against humanity.

Based on the evidence set out in this report, Human Rights Watch calls for the investigation of other crimes against humanity, including persecution against any identifiable group on racial, national, ethnic or religious grounds; rape or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity; and extermination. These would amount to crimes against humanity if criminal acts meeting the respective definitions of the crimes were committed, and these crimes were committed as part of the “attack” directed against a civilian population.

Palestinian Armed Groups Responsible for Abuses

Evidence collected and analyzed by Human Rights Watch, including statements by witnesses, statements by Hamas officials, and verified video and social media content, demonstrates that the October 7 assault was organized and planned well in advance. The consistent patterns of behavior of the fighters during the attacks and their armaments, vehicles and attire, also indicated a high degree of planning and organization.

Human Rights Watch was able to confirm the participation of various Palestinians armed groups based on headbands the fighters wore to indicate their group affiliation and based on posts that armed groups issued on their Telegram channels claiming responsibility for their actions, including acts of abuse.

Human Rights Watch found strong evidence of the participation of at least five Palestinian armed groups from Gaza in the attacks: Hamas’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades; the Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s armed wing, the Quds Brigades; the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine’s armed wing, the National Resistance Brigades or Omar al-Qasim Forces; the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine’s armed wing, the Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades; and the Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, formerly linked to the Fatah political faction.

These groups’ participation was largely confirmed through a detailed analysis of the attackers visible in videos taken during the attacks, including CCTV and body camera footage, some wearing colored headbands linked to specific armed groups, as well as an identification of the Telegram social media channels belonging to specific armed groups on which the footage of abuse was posted, with captions claiming responsibility for the acts shown.

All of these groups were members of a “Joint Operations Room” in Gaza that during escalations in hostilities engage in training, planning and carrying out armed operations against Israel.

The Qassam Brigades led the attack and was the most active armed group on October 7. The group carried out 10 of the 13 breaches of the physical barrier separating Gaza and Israel that Human Rights Watch documented. Their presence is visible in at least 14 different locations across southern Israel, where verified videos show the Qassam Brigades’ fighters taking hostages and killing civilians and members of the Israeli security forces.

The footage analyzed also shows that the Qassam Brigades and the other armed groups involved in the assault coordinated with, and integrated into it, some individuals who appear to be Palestinian civilians from Gaza who committed abuses in conjunction with these forces.

Hamas’s Response to Allegations of Abuse

Hamas responded on April 14, 2024 with a nine-page letter that is attached as an annex and cited throughout this report to questions submitted by Human Rights Watch on February 28. The main assertions made in the letter are that: its armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, planned the operation, which it called “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood,” and led the October 7 assault; “Hamas is committed to respecting international and human rights law”; “the Qassam Brigades was clear in directing its members and fighters not to target civilians”; and it has a “military doctrine not to target civilians.”

It blamed unaffiliated Palestinians from Gaza, who it said crossed through the breached border opportunistically, for committing some of the abuses: “People rushed out, along with Palestinian groups that were not participating in the military operation, resulting in chaos in the field and, thus, changing the plan to conduct an operation against military targets.” It added that after the initial, planned attack occurred, “the subsequent stage, in which Gaza residents and armed forces rushed in without coordination with Hamas, led to many mistakes.”

Several Hamas leaders have spoken publicly about the October 7 assault, including praising the operation overall that day but distancing the group from abuses committed. An English-language document titled “Our Narrative… Operation Al-Aqsa Flood,” issued by the Hamas Media Office on January 21, 2024, states that the attacks only targeted Israeli military sites and fighters avoided harming civilians, and cites chaos on the breached fence areas.

Human Rights Watch has found that based on the information presented in this report, the Hamas claim that on October 7 its forces did not seek to harm Israeli civilians is false—rather, it was part of the plan from the outset. Accounts from survivors along with photographs and verified videos from the attacks show Palestinian fighters seeking out civilians and killing them across the attack sites from the first moments that the assault began, indicating that the intentional killing and hostage-taking of civilians was planned and highly coordinated.

Civilian Deaths in Crossfire

There were ongoing government probes into the role the Israeli armed forces played in contributing to the civilian death toll at the time of writing.

Human Rights Watch is aware of at least two incidents in which Palestinian fighters appear to have used civilians as human shields. Using human shields is a violation of the laws of war and a war crime.

Recovering the Bodies

The scale and intensity of the Palestinian armed group attacks and the subsequent fighting, the taking of scores of hostages to Gaza, and the number of bodies and wounded dispersed across a large area complicated the task for Israeli authorities of promptly recovering and identifying the victims. The initial number of civilians pronounced as killed was later lowered, which Israeli authorities attribute to the confusion in identifying the recovered human remains and determining whether they were victims or attackers.

On October 7, Israeli authorities did not prioritize the gathering of forensic evidence. This has made it more difficult to know with precision the scale and nature of the abuses committed. Members of ZAKA, an umbrella group of voluntary community emergency response teams in Israel, arrived at sites soon after the attacks in some cases as they were ongoing and the military had arrived. ZAKA members collected many of the bodies from the attack sites. Their priority was to, in accordance with Jewish law, preserve Jewish human remains, identify the dead, and allow families to bury their loved ones quickly and with dignity in accordance with Jewish law. Remains were placed in body bags and transported to the Shura Military Base, after which the authorities handed them over to the families for burial.

Aftermath of the Assault

For the survivors of the October 7 attacks, their communities remain in tatters. Rotem Holin from Kfar Aza, who had moved with her two young children to a hotel repurposed as a temporary shelter, described the impact of the attack on her kibbutz in late October:

All parties to the armed conflict in Gaza and Israel should fully abide by international humanitarian law. The Palestinian armed groups in Gaza should immediately and unconditionally release civilians held hostage. They should take appropriate disciplinary measures against armed group members responsible for war crimes, and should transfer for prosecution any individuals facing warrants from the ICC.

Turkey, Iran, Qatar and other countries that have relations with Hamas, its armed wing, and the other armed groups involved in the assault should seek the immediate release of the remaining civilian hostages. Countries providing arms to the Palestinian armed groups who participated in the assault, including Iran, should suspend arms transfers so long as these groups continue to commit violations of the laws of war that go unpunished.

To facilitate independent documentation of abuses by all parties, Israeli and Palestinian authorities and armed groups should cooperate with and provide unhindered access to all of Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory to the UN Commission of Inquiry; the ICC; relevant UN special procedures; and independent human rights organizations.

To Hamas, the Qassam Brigades and Other Palestinian Armed Groups Participating in the October 7 Assault

• Publish a complete list of all the people being held hostage and bodies they are withholding;

• Immediately release all civilians held hostage;

• So long as they hold hostages, ensure that all hostages are treated humanely; held in humane conditions, with access to adequate medical care, food, and shelter; and are allowed to communicate privately with their families and receive visits from an impartial humanitarian agency;

• Ensure that any hostages who are particularly at risk, including older people, any survivors of sexual violence, and those injured or otherwise requiring medical treatment, are immediately given access to adequate and appropriate treatment and services, and are prioritized for release to facilitate their access to medical and psychosocial support services and mental health care;

• Immediately cease unlawful attacks, including indiscriminate attacks and targeted attacks against civilians, including the launching of unguided rockets and projectiles toward Israeli population centers;

• Take appropriate disciplinary actions against members responsible for ordering or carrying out serious violations of international law;

• Cooperate with international authorities, including the International Criminal Court (ICC), UN Commission of Inquiry, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and other relevant UN mechanisms and experts, including in order to ensure justice and reparations for victims for crimes committed during the October 7 assault;

• Provide prompt and appropriate compensation to victims and their families for deaths, injuries, acts of sexual violence, and property damage resulting from unlawful attacks.

To Palestinian Authorities

• Publicly call on all groups holding civilian hostages in Gaza to release them;

• Conduct transparent, credible, and impartial investigations into credible allegations of laws-of-war violations committed by persons under their jurisdiction, including those violations detailed in this report, and prosecute in fair, transparent proceedings, those credibly implicated in the abuses at all levels;

• Make public the findings of the investigations including into the intended military targets of attacks, if any, that resulted in civilian casualties, and attacks that directly or indirectly damaged civilian infrastructure and other protected objects;

• Cooperate with international authorities, including the ICC, UN Commission of Inquiry, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and other relevant UN mechanisms and experts, including in order to ensure justice and reparations for victims for crimes committed during the October 7 attacks, including for acts of sexual and gender-based violence;

• Do not cooperate or coordinate with or support armed groups credibly found to perpetrate systematic abuses against civilians; and in particular the Qassam Brigades, Quds Brigades, National Resistance Brigades or Omar al-Qasim Forces, Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades, and Aqsa Martyrs Brigades;

• Publicly condemn all targeted, indiscriminate and otherwise unlawful attacks against civilians.

To the Israeli Government

To the UN Security Council

• Demand unimpeded access throughout Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory for the ICC, UN Commission of Inquiry, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, other relevant UN mechanisms and experts, and independent human rights organizations investigating the events of October 7 and subsequent hostilities between Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups.

To All States

• Impose or keep in place targeted sanctions, including asset freezes and travel bans, against officials and entities responsible for ongoing grave abuses, while ensuring that these measures do not harm civilians and nongovernmental organizations performing internationally protected activities in Gaza and elsewhere in Palestine. All those targeted with sanctions should have the opportunity to challenge such decisions in fair, prompt proceedings by independent courts and judges;

• Suspend arms and military assistance to the Palestinian armed groups credibly implicated in grave abuses, so long as they systematically commit abuses amounting to war crimes and possible crimes against humanity with impunity;

• Investigate and prosecute those credibly implicated in international crimes committed as part of the October 7 assault, under the principle of universal jurisdiction and in fair, transparent proceedings in accordance with international due process standards;

• Support UN investigations into the October 7 assault and urge that the armed Palestinian armed groups involved and Israel cooperate with the ICC, UN Commission of Inquiry, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, other relevant UN mechanisms and experts, and independent human rights organizations;

• Protect the ICC’s independence and publicly condemn efforts to intimidate or interfere with the court’s work, its officials, and those cooperating with the institution; 

• Express support for any arrest warrants the ICC may issue, commit to working to ensure the execution of such warrants, and press Palestinian and Israeli authorities to cooperate with the court;

• Support independent justice mechanisms;

• Demand unimpeded access throughout Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory for UN and international justice mechanisms and independent human rights investigators into the events of October 7 and the subsequent hostilities between Israeli force and Palestinian armed groups.

To the Governments of Egypt, Iran, Turkey, and Qatar and other Gulf States that have Relations with, or Influence over the Qassam Brigades and other Armed Groups in Gaza that Participated in the Assault

• Use influence over Palestinian armed groups that hold civilian hostages to push for their immediate and unconditional release.

• Use influence over Palestinian armed groups that participated in the October 7 assault and other attacks on civilians to respect international humanitarian law, in particular Common Article 3 of the four Geneva Conventions of 1949, as per their obligations under Common Article 1.

   

Human Rights Watch interviewed 144 people for this report, most in person in Israel in October and November 2023. Other people were interviewed remotely between October 2023 and June 2024. This includes 94 survivors and witnesses from the October 7 assault. Human Rights Watch also spoke to seven family members of victims and survivors, some of whom went to the attack sites during evacuations or immediately afterward.

Human Rights Watch spoke to two medical experts hired by the Israeli government to examine the remains collected by ZAKA (see below) and provide forensic advice. We also interviewed 17 service providers, investigators, and advocates who were collecting information about acts of gender-based violence reported to have been committed during the attacks.

Human Rights Watch interviewed a former member of the Israel Defense Forces who took part in fighting on October 7. We also spoke to nine journalists who visited the attack sites immediately after the fighting.

Most of those interviewed were Jewish Israelis, but we also interviewed Palestinians from Gaza, Palestinian citizens of Israel, and foreign workers from Nepal, Thailand, and the Philippines.

Interviews were primarily conducted in Hebrew with the assistance of interpreters, and in Arabic, English, Spanish, and Thai.

Researchers informed all interviewees about the purpose and voluntary nature of the interviews, and the ways in which Human Rights Watch would use the information. We obtained consent from all interviewees, who understood they would receive no compensation for their participation. The names of some interviewees quoted in this report have been changed at their request to protect their privacy. Those referred to with a first name and a single initial surname have been given pseudonyms, while those with complete first names and surnames have not.

Human Rights Watch attempted to interview survivors from all the civilian sites that came under attack on October 7, but was ultimately unable to interview those from the attacks on Moshav Pri Gan, Moshav Yachini, and the Psyduck music festival.

On November 5, Human Rights Watch visited Kibbutz Be’eri. Despite numerous requests, Israeli authorities never granted Human Rights Watch permission to visit any of the other attack sites.

Human Rights Watch verified over 280 videos and photographs taken during or just after the October 7 assault, including 157 which were uploaded onto social media platforms and news websites and 123 which were shared directly with researchers. A researcher also attended a screening of a roughly 45-minute video made of different pieces of footage from October 7, at the invitation of the Israeli consulate in Los Angeles.

As per our standard methodology, each video and photograph verified by open-source researchers at Human Rights Watch was then reviewed by members of staff with visual verification expertise. To determine the location of each video and photograph, researchers matched landmarks with available satellite imagery, street-level photographs, or other visual material. Where possible, Human Rights Watch used the position of the sun and any resulting shadows visible in videos and photographs to estimate the time the content was recorded at. Researchers also confirmed that each piece of content had not appeared online prior to October 7, using various reverse search image engines.

Human Rights Watch has adopted specific terminology to distinguish between audiovisual content that we have analyzed and audiovisual content that we have also verified. In the report, Human Rights Watch uses the term “analyzed” for content that has been reviewed and appears authentic, but we have been unable to confirm all temporal, geographic, or contextual aspects. We use the term “verified” for videos or photographs where we were able to confirm the location, timeframe, and context in which they were taken.

When reviewing closed-circuit television (CCTV) and dashcam footage, researchers did not assume the timestamps visible on the videos to be accurate; programming errors, different time zones, daylight savings time, and other factors could have created discrepancies. However, these timestamps have been included in descriptions of videos where relevant. Human Rights Watch reviewed each video frame-by-frame to document how people had been killed, injured, or in other ways harmed.

Much of the visual material Human Rights Watch analyzed was recorded and edited by Palestinian armed groups or CCTV and dashcam footage redistributed by an anonymous Telegram group of self-described Israeli first responders called South First Responders. While Human Rights Watch verified events depicted in content shared by these groups, both the armed groups and South First Responders curated the content they made available. Researchers do not know how much footage they chose not to upload. In addition, much of the footage has been cut and edited together into montages. The report includes claims made by South First Responders in the captions that accompany the videos they posted, with a note indicating whether Human Rights Watch has been able to verify them. When such claims are included, the report states the provenance as originating from the captions of the South First Responders channel.

Each armed group’s main Telegram channel posted videos that explicitly claim responsibility for the acts that take place in the video. Many footage montages depicting abuses begin with a title card reading, for example, “Scenes of Quds Brigades storming a number of military posts and settlements in Gaza Envelope as part of Al-Aqsa Flood battle.” On the day of the attack, and in the following days, researchers could not identify any content being cross posted across the various channels, giving a high level of confidence that the content posted was produced by the group running the channel, showing acts that group carried out.

In analyzing the videos, researchers noted consistency between the colored headbands or arm bands with specific insignia that many fighters wear, which match the logos of specific armed groups, and the Telegram channels in which they appear. No armed group channels shared videos of people wearing colors or insignias from different groups.

By identifying the colors and insignias that fighters wore and flagging videos that show them wearing distinctive apparel, Human Rights Watch was able to gain some insights into the level of various Palestinian armed groups’ involvement in the attacks. Human Rights Watch reviewed verified videos to examine what attackers said and if, when, or how armed groups indicated intent or coordinated their attacks. Human Rights Watch was unable to determine whether individuals without insignia or distinctive apparel were affiliated with the groups involved.

To protect the privacy and dignity of victims and survivors, Human Rights Watch has not included direct links to the videos and photographs found online. However, for the purpose of transparency and to allow for independent analysis, we have provided citations of the footage we have analyzed and the date on which it was shared online. The dates of the videos included in the citations correspond to the local time of posting in Israel. The videos and photographs used in the analysis of this report have been preserved by Human Rights Watch in the event they are removed from online sources.

Two independent forensic pathologists reviewed 12 photographs and videos of human remains that Human Rights Watch analyzed and provided their professional assessments.

In all cases where we provide numbers of those killed in various locations, we provide the source for those numbers. Many of the figures in this report concerning the number of those killed during and in the immediate aftermath of the assault, are based on the tally of victims developed by the news service Agence France-Presse (AFP). To calculate its figures, AFP cross-referenced data published separately by Israel’s social security agency, the armed forces, the police, the Shin Bet security agency and the prime minister’s office for Israelis killed at the attack sites between October 7 and 10, and other sources including its own reporting to identify non-Israeli victims. Human Rights Watch notes, however, that AFP did not count soldiers, police, or members of the rapid response teams as civilians, although police and members of the rapid response teams who do not have a permanent combat role are normally civilians under the laws of war. Human Rights Watch has re-published the overall AFP figures because of the rigorous methodology the agency used to verify its figures, which it shared with Human Rights Watch.

Consistent with our global approach to armed conflicts, Human Rights Watch in this report applies international humanitarian law binding on both states and non-state armed groups in the conduct of hostilities, as well as applicable international human rights law and international criminal law.

It is not within the mandate of Human Rights Watch to address whether any party was justified in resorting to armed force. Human Rights Watch maintains a position of neutrality on issues of jus ad bellum (the law governing justifications to go to war) in order to credibly encourage all sides in armed conflicts to respect jus in bello (the law governing acceptable conduct in war), including and especially protections for civilians. In our reporting globally, Human Rights Watch does not apply the term “terrorists” or “terrorism” to specific actors or acts as there is no internationally agreed-upon definition, and because the label has no bearing on the international legal obligations of warring parties. We did not alter quotes when the terms were used by survivors or witnesses.

Consistent with Human Rights Watch practice in armed conflicts involving non-state armed groups, we typically refer to apparent members of those groups engaged in hostilities as “fighters,” regardless of the terms they or others may use. Members of national armies, in this case the Israel armed forces, are typically referred to as “soldiers.”

In March, Human Rights Watch sent letters with a summary of its findings and questions to senior representatives of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. On April 14, Hamas replied with responses (henceforth referred to as the April 14 Hamas letter) that have been included in the report where relevant. The response is included in full in the appendix of the report. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad confirmed receipt of the letter but had not provided any substantive response at time of writing.

From January through March, Human Rights Watch sent letters to various Israeli authorities, including the Prime Minister’s Office, Israeli armed forces, Israeli Police, Police Unit Lahav 433, Ministry of Health, and Office of the State Attorney requesting information about the government’s investigations into crimes committed during the October 7 assault.

Human Rights Watch received responses from the Israeli Police, the Office of the State Attorney, and the Israeli armed forces between February 1 and May 23. None of the responses included any substantive information into the government’s investigations or evidence of abuses perpetrated. A representative of the Israeli Police said it was not obligated under Israeli law to provide this information. The Office of the State Attorney said it did not have this information and referred us to other authorities. The Prime Minister’s Office requested an extension to respond to our letter, committing to do so by July 17, 2024.

Human Rights Watch has not attempted to address directly the considerable misinformation that has circulated about the October 7 events. We have, however responded to inaccurate claims made in the April 14 Hamas letter.

At least five Palestinian armed groups participated in the October 7 assault, with two more claiming they also participated. There is some evidence of an eighth group having possibly participated.

Aqsa Martyrs Brigades fighters often wear either yellow or white headbands with black writing to identify themselves.

North and east of the Gaza Strip, in an area of Israel known as the “Gaza Envelope,” are dozens of small communities, most surrounded by security fences. The communities, some of them kibbutzim, operate farms and small industries. The communities are largely populated by Jewish Israelis. Many host foreign workers and students, who live and work in the communities. Palestinian citizens of Israel and from the Occupied Palestinian Territory also often work in these communities.

The principle of non-reciprocity is a fundamental underpinning of international humanitarian law: abuses by one party to the conflict can never justify abuses by the other. Nothing—no act or policy or crime attributable to Israeli authorities—can justify the killing, mutilation, hostage-taking, and other crimes that forces led by the Qassam Brigades carried out inside Israel on October 7, 2023, just as the October 7 assault cannot justify the war crimes and atrocities carried out by Israeli forces in Gaza. 

Following the October 7 attacks, the Israeli government evacuated many of the communities in the “Gaza Envelope.” Most residents of these communities had not returned to their homes, at the time of writing. 

The Qassam Brigades’ rocket attacks that morning were central to its strategy. Interviewees who were in the “Gaza Envelope” consistently described hearing air raid sirens triggered by rockets sound at 6:30 a.m., prompting many to go into their safe rooms, or, for those outside their homes, into communal bomb shelters.

Fighters from the Qassam Brigades and other Palestinian armed groups then breached the barrier that Israel has erected around the Gaza Strip in several locations and entered Israel in cars, on motorbikes, on foot, and by motorized paraglider. Some fighters came on boats from sea. The fighters began assaulting military bases, communities, and music festivals.

The Qassam Brigades-led fighters carried out numerous laws-of-war violations during their attacks on at least nineteen kibbutzim and five moshavim (cooperative communities), two cities, two music festivals, and a beach party, as well as multiple military bases, within the “Gaza Envelope.” Not all Palestinian armed group attempts to enter communities or other sites were successful.

In its April 14 letter containing responses to queries from Human Rights Watch based on its findings, Hamas confirmed that the rocket attacks, the breaches of the barrier, and attacks on surveillance equipment were all coordinated components of the assault.

Jewish Israelis were the largest number of victims of the attacks, but fighters also killed, wounded, or took hostage dual nationals, Palestinian citizens of Israel, Palestinians from Gaza, and foreigners, including Chinese, Filipino, Nepali, Sri Lankan and Thai nationals, and at least one national each from Cambodia, Canada, Eritrea, Germany, Mexico, Sudan, Tanzania and the United Kingdom, some of whom were Jewish. In some cases, fighters allowed some people who identified themselves as Palestinians to flee the area unharmed.

Once civilians were evacuated, the Israeli armed forces continued to battle Palestinian fighters who were still operating inside some areas of Israel for days.

Human Rights Watch found that during the operation on October 7, fighters led by Hamas’s Qassam Brigades committed numerous serious violations of international humanitarian law and human rights abuses. Serious violations of the laws of war, many of which may amount to war crimes, include attacks on civilians and civilian objects, unlawful killings, cruel and inhuman treatment, sexual and gender-based violence, mutilation, hostage-taking, destruction of property, use of human shields, and pillage. As this report shows, some of these criminal acts took place as part of a widespread and systematic attack pursuant to an organizational policy, and amount to crimes against humanity.

The April 14 Hamas letter states that the Qassam Brigades forces were instructed not to target civilians, citing a speech to that effect made by the commander-in-chief of the Qassam Brigades. Elsewhere, the letter states that Hamas defines combatants and civilians in line with international humanitarian law, but in the same paragraph adds that most of those it detained during the assault were “found to be working for the Israeli army on tasks of a military nature, even if not directly related to combat,” thereby raising questions about how Hamas defines civilians.

The April 14 Hamas letter states that the Qassam Brigades aimed to target the Israeli armed forces and Shin Bet, Israel’s internal intelligence security agency, blaming the quick collapse in the Israeli military’s defenses, and the participation of other armed groups and people as leading to “chaos in the field and, thus, changing the plan to conduct an operation against military targets.” Later, the letter says there were Israeli military targets at the civilian sites including the kibbutzim, and that their presence “indicates Israel’s use of these civilian objects as human shields.” Purportedly as evidence of its claim that the Qassam Brigades did not target civilians, the letter says forces bypassed some civilians closer to the Gaza Strip than the people they attacked.

The letter says the initial part of the assault went largely to plan, but that later stages “led to many mistakes. This operation and everything arising from it require a thorough examination from our side, but it cannot be done at the moment.” However, the letter also notes that “a lack of precision or guided weapons comes in the context of explaining the circumstances that led to injuring civilians during the attacks by Hamas and resistance [groups].” The letter adds that, “the Israeli army bears great responsibility for the killing of many settlers, as noted in Israel’s own reports, either during the targeting of the Spring Festival with planes and artillery shells or the bombing of homes where there were Israeli civilians on suspicion of the possible presence of resistance fighters there.” It says that Hamas fighters carried only “light military equipment” and that much of the violence and destruction was caused by “weaponry not owned by Palestinian resistance fighters but by the Israeli military.”

Contrary to these claims of Hamas and notwithstanding the findings of ongoing government probes into the role the Israeli armed forces played in contributing to the civilian death toll on October 7, evidence collected by Human Rights Watch indicates that only relatively few civilians died during fighting between Israeli armed forces and Palestinian armed groups. Human Rights Watch did not find evidence to support the claim that the majority of the deaths were caused by heavy weapons only used by Israeli forces and not by Palestinian armed groups.

The following sections describe the planning of the assault and detail attacks carried out at civilian sites over the course of October 7 and abuses that occurred. The reporting is not a comprehensive account of the abuses committed. The locations are listed in order from the highest to lowest number of civilian casualties, with the largest number of civilians killed and taken hostage at the Supernova music festival and the Be’eri and Kfar Aza kibbutzim.

Planning of the Assault

There is considerable evidence demonstrating the overall planned nature of the October 7 assault, including the complexity of the attack, the number of armed groups involved, and consistency of the methods used during the attack. One key aspect of the assault that required considerable planning was the breaching of the barrier between the Gaza Strip and southern Israel.

The footage shows that at least 10 breaches occurred early in the morning. Human Rights Watch verified eight of these incidents through videos shared on the Hamas and Qassam Brigades’ affiliate channels. In two other breaches, Human Rights Watch observed on the attackers either patches or headbands with symbols and wordings showing affiliation with the Qassam Brigades. However, in one specific incident near Kibbutz Sufa to the north, one individual is seen wearing a red headband, which is not usually associated with the Qassam Brigades. Two brigades that Human Rights Watch verified participated in the October 7 attacks wear red headbands, the Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades and the National Resistance Brigades. Human Rights Watch was not able to confirm the presence of any other brigade participating in the breaches that occurred in the early morning hours of the assault.

The nature of this initial phase of the assault, including the types of targets, the fact that individual attacks were timed to occur simultaneously or in quick succession, all point to a high degree of planning, coordination, and communication among the participating armed groups.

Local Forces that Fought to Repel the Assault –Kitot Konenut (“Rapid Response Teams”)

The ICRC Interpretive Guidance states:

Supernova Music Festival

Accounts from Survivors

Sagi B., who was also part of the security team, was near the stage when his colleague Bar Kupershtein radioed him, saying there was a wounded person about 300 meters from the festival site in the field near the main road:

Sagi had started driving the wounded in the golf cart to the two ambulances they had on the festival grounds when he got a call from other security officers saying that jeeps were approaching. By the time he returned to the location where he had found the injured man, “only one policeman was still alive, and the vehicles were on fire,” Sagi said. “There was gunfire and RPG fire all around.” Sagi, who was armed, took cover behind vehicles and said he saw around 20 gunmen, all in green pants and black or green shirts, and body armor, with the exception of one man who appeared to be the commander, who was wearing a tiger-stripe patterned camouflage uniform. The gunmen were carrying what he identified as machine guns, RPGs, AK-style assault rifles, and M4 assault rifles. Sagi saw gunmen shooting people, then checking their bodies to see if they were dead, and then firing more rounds at them. He said soon after, an armored vehicle he identified as a tank arrived with Israeli soldiers inside who had been injured. One soldier from the tank handed him a weapon, and immediately thereafter was shot and killed. The remaining police officer was also shot, leaving Sagi to continue shooting at the gunmen on his own. He said:

I was encircled and alone. They kept firing at me, including with an RPG. A bullet hit me in the right thigh. I realized I could not fight anymore because I was injured and had run out of ammunition. So, I had to run 450 meters through an open field as they were shooting at me. I miraculously made it to the tree line alive. I made an improvised tourniquet and stayed there until 2 p.m., when a group of soldiers and a man whose wife had called him to rescue her from the party evacuated me.

He was as confused as we were, so we decided to try to navigate ourselves out… But the main road felt like a road of death. We saw cars stopped in a weird way along the side of the road. Then we saw a white pickup truck parked in the intersection between the dirt road and the main road and we noticed a man with a bulletproof vest and a rifle standing by the truck … We discussed whether he was a soldier or a terrorist but said there is no way a terrorist would just be standing there.

They drove toward him. “When he noticed us,” Senior said, “he went to the back of his truck and pulled out a machine gun and aimed it at us.” Only one bullet hit the car when he opened fire, after which Senior thinks the gun may have jammed. Senior and his friend and the two women sped away. None of their phones had reception, so they used the position of the sun to figure out which way was east, to drive away from Gaza. As they drove, they passed Thai workers in a field. Senior yelled to the workers to run away because assailants were coming but, “They just sat there looking at the rockets flying above their heads and gave us a thumbs up, like they didn’t understand us.” Senior, his friend, and the two women made it safely to Senior’s home in Be’er Sheva. Human Rights Watch was unable to learn what happened to the Thai workers.

Human Rights Watch was not able to obtain sufficient information about the Israeli military response to the attack on the Supernova music festival to accurately report on what occurred once soldiers arrived in the area.

Footage of Abuses

Aftermath of the Attack

There was smoke, gunfire, and rockets. We saw lots of people from the festival trying to flee to safety. As we got closer, police stopped us because they had closed off the main road. So, we went to the hospitals looking for [Sharona]. We went to multiple police stations, and we were showing photos of her to all the people we met who had been [at the festival].

Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

The report of the UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict said in its discussion of the Supernova site that:

As people who had attended the festival fled, one of the routes many of them took was along Route 232, the main artery running from northeast to southwest, through many of the attack sites. The special representative found in relation to fleeing festivalgoers at that location:

Kibbutz Be’eri

Human Rights Watch interviewed 18 kibbutz residents who witnessed the attack, a Kibbutz Be’eri employee, and a festivalgoer who fled to and sheltered in Be’eri. Human Rights Watch researchers visited the kibbutz on November 5 but did not have unrestricted access to the site.

Accounts from Survivors

Amit Man, the paramedic, and Hunwald struggled to treat the injured man, Gil Boyum, a member of the rapid response team. Hunwald said after a few minutes, Shachar Zemach, another member of the rapid response team, arrived. They dragged Boyum into the building. “He was very heavy and there was a lot of blood. There was a blood trail. I cannot erase it from my mind, all the blood.”

The calls for help kept coming in and Hunwald told everyone who was injured to come to them. Hunwald called Daniel Levi, a doctor, for assistance. Those who made it to the clinic were members of the rapid response team. Some, like Yoel Friedman, were treated briefly before returning to fight off the attackers. Another member of the rapid response team, Yair Avital, was seriously injured, so another member of the rapid response team, Eitan Haddad, took his body armor and assault rifle and began firing at gunmen in the vicinity of the clinic.

Hunwald said that around 2 p.m., they ran out of ammunition and the attackers converged on the dental clinic, shooting Man, who was unarmed. They hid in the clinic, but the attackers threw three or four grenades inside. Man, Zemach, and Haddad were killed. Hunwald recalls: “I still hear Amit [Man] screaming, ‘Help! Help! They shot me and I don’t want to die!’”

Hunwald and Avital hid in the clinic as the gunmen roamed and damaged the clinic. Hunwald took shelter in the bathroom: “They didn’t come to the bathroom, but I heard them for two hours going in and out and shooting and throwing grenades. They burned a lot of houses nearby.” Hunwald said that the gunmen had set up some sort of command center across from the clinic, in the kindergarten.

Human Rights Watch visited the dental clinic on November 5 and observed damage consistent with fragmentation hand grenades in the clinic, as well as small arms fire, including casings consistent with firearms carried by the rapid response team and the attackers. Human Rights Watch also found casings consistent with the caliber of the AK-style firearms used by many Palestinian fighters, and damage consistent with small arms and rocket fire in the children’s school across from the dental clinic.

Hunwald said the attackers were speaking to each other on handheld radios. “I could see the radios and walkie-talkies they were carrying. I could hear the crackling of the radio.” She said that she heard them say “Itbah al Yahoud” (“Slaughter the Jews”) in Arabic while they were walking around. “They were just laughing and talking like it’s a normal day.”

It was 4 p.m. when the Israeli military came to rescue Hunwald and Avital. Avital was still in serious condition and kept losing consciousness, Hunwald said. The Israeli military was eventually able to get Hunwald, her family, Avital, and around 20 other civilians, including children, to a field adjacent to the kibbutz. From there, they were evacuated by bus out of the “Gaza Envelope.”

Shifroni said smoke started seeping through the door:

Shifroni started hearing gunfire and shouts in Arabic growing nearer, so he grabbed a neighbor’s bicycle and rode with his daughter to the other side of the kibbutz, to his father’s home, where his wife and son were. On the way, his daughter warned him whenever she saw attackers in the distance. They reunited with Shifroni’s wife, son, and his brother’s family in the safe room in his father’s home, and they improvised a way of blocking the door.

At about 2 p.m., gunmen also entered the home of Shifroni’s father. Shifroni recalls: “We piled the children on top of each other and we covered them with our bodies. My son started to cry that it was not fair that he would die so young—he had just turned 8. I told him, ‘No one is going die today.’” The gunmen started shooting through the door, but at that point the Israeli military was arriving in the kibbutz and the attackers fled. Finally, at 7:30 p.m., soldiers took the family from their home. They sent Shifroni to the hospital at midnight.

Killings

Pillage and Looting

Taking of Hostages

At around noon, Sharabi said, “We heard them [attackers] downstairs shouting and talking in Arabic and laughing.” Sharabi said the family soon heard the gunmen in their house, approaching the safe room. Although her husband tried to hold the handle, they forced their way in. “They came in with their guns. There were three of them. They shot our dog. We were begging. We just held up our hands and said, ‘Please don’t kill us, please don’t do anything to us.’” She said they asked if there were any guns or weapons in the house, and the family said they had nothing. Then the gunmen took them out of the house at gunpoint: “We didn’t try to resist. They took us down to the [nearby houses] and made us sit between the two houses in the garden. When we got downstairs, they took our phones. I saw a neighbor, Tal, and her three kids. They let us sit near them. They took a selfie with us. They tied my husband’s hands with a rope.” She said that the attackers also found t-shirts for her daughter and her daughter’s boyfriend, who had not been fully dressed when they were forced from the safe room.

Sharabi, who understands some Arabic, said that the gunmen also stomped on an Israeli flag and said, in Arabic: “This is not Israel, this is Palestine.” She said she also heard them say, “Kill all the Jews.”

Footage of Abuses

Human Rights Watch verified 12 videos posted to social media showing killings, hostage-taking, looting, and damage to property in Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7.

Aftermath of the Attack

The bodies were found near the “bodies of lots of terrorists,” according to Dyksztejn.

The UN Special Representative on sexual violence in conflict and her team visited Be’eri. Her report stated:

Israeli Armed Forces’ Response

Kibbutz Kfar Aza

Human Rights Watch interviewed 18 members of Kibbutz Kfar Aza, 17 of whom were at home at the time of the attack, and one relative of a member.

Accounts from Survivors

Then, her house came under attack from the Israeli military, which blew some holes into the walls. This ventilated the room but also brought in smoke, and when her family was finally rescued, she said they all had black ash caked around their nostrils.

Iftach Yacobi, 21, was in his safe room in Kfar Aza with his parents and his grandmother who uses a wheelchair, when gunmen came into their home:

Gal K. was in his safe room with his wife at 8 a.m., when they received messages from their son Yuval, who also lived in Kfar Aza, saying that his house was under attack. Gal said:

At 8 a.m. or something like that, my son said some terrorists were attacking. So, he went out with a knife and stabbed one of them in the head and kicked another one of them. And they shot him and wounded him. I told him to tie something to his leg, like a tourniquet. In the meantime, my grandchildren were writing, ‘Grandpa, come save us! The terrorists are here!’ There was a long WhatsApp correspondence. I tried to calm them down. Around 10:30, Yuval, who was injured before, said many terrorists were coming in and he was going out to fight them and he was not sure he would come back, and he loved us. A week later we got a message that he had been killed.

Rotem Holin, 44, was at home with her children, ages 5 and 7, in their safe room when, at noon, six gunmen in black uniforms entered the house and fired once at the safe room door. The bullet skimmed her hand, and the door opened. She said:

The gunmen then asked her where “the soldiers” were, expecting the Israeli military to be present. One asked whether they were currently in Kfar Aza or in Kibbutz Sa’ad. For the next two hours, one gunman sat in the safe room watching her and her children, while the rest ate, drank, and used the toilet, before they eventually left.

Footage from the Attack

Taking of Hostages

Response of the Rapid Response Team

Kibbutz resident Yosi Sosna said he saw another member of the rapid response team, Ofir Libstein, and his next-door neighbor and member of a local municipality emergency team, Omer Tzadikevitch, leave for the armory at about 6:30 a.m. He said others saw the two men leaving the armory and head toward their homes. Neither survived the attack. Sosna, a close friend of both families, said Libstein’s son eventually found his father’s body lying just meters from their home, after using the “Find My” feature on his iPhone. Tzadikevitch’s body was found next to his car, outside his house.

Gunmen killed seven of the kibbutz’s 14-member rapid response team during the attack, residents said.

Israeli Armed Forces’ Response

Cohen told Human Rights Watch:

Our next door neighbor, who was rescued, told me that when she saw soldiers firing at our house, she said, ‘There is a family inside, what are you doing?’ She said one soldier replied, ‘Nobody can survive what happened in this house. If there was a family there, they are dead.’

At around 7 a.m. on October 8, Cohen heard a military vehicle passing by, so she quietly opened the window and tried to signal to the vehicle that they were inside, “I waved to the soldiers, but they thought we were the terrorists, and they start shooting at the window.” Finally, at around 10 a.m., she yelled out to soldiers from the window, and they saw her and were able to rescue her and her family, while gunmen were still in her home. When they left their house, they saw parts of it had been totally destroyed.

Tzuman said his father, Reuven Tzuman, 77, was injured by Israeli forces. He said his father did not want to speak about the experience, but Tzuman reported what his mother who was there told him:

Israeli authorities have not reported on the number of Israeli civilians who were inadvertently killed by Israeli troops on October 7.

Sexual Violence

The UN Special Representative on sexual violence in conflict wrote:

Ofakim

Bilia, who understands some Arabic, described what happened next:

I told my husband to close the window. Before he did, we heard them speaking Arabic. They were saying things like, “Go there,” they said a name, I think Ahmed, “Go check this,” or “Mohammed,” short commands. … I don’t know if they saw my husband when he yelled out. They were busy killing the policeman, and maybe they didn’t care.

“We stayed on the neighbor’s roof for four or five hours with our kids and we heard the whole war around us,” Bilia said, adding that there were gunmen on a nearby roof throwing grenades and firing RPGs. At one point, she said they heard return fire:

Kibbutz Nir Oz

A video recorded at approximately 7 a.m. on October 7 and shared by the Qassam Brigades Telegram channel, shows fighters just inside Israel’s barrier with Gaza. Nir Oz was the closest kibbutz to the area in the video, which was one of the 12 locations at which fighters breached the barrier.

Response of the Rapid Response Team

Smilansky went to the house of his friends, Yonatan (“Jonny”) and Tamar Kedem-Siman Tov, who had three children. “I heard from other friends who said they thought Jonny had a problem,” Smilansky said. “When I got there, they were already dead.” He said the parents had been shot, but the children appeared to have died from asphyxiation inside the bomb shelter because their home was burned. When Smilansky returned to Nir Oz on October 27, he took photographs of the shelter, showing the room’s floor covered in blood, which he shared with Human Rights Watch.

Accounts from Survivors

Yael Benezra, 48, whose parents lived in Nir Oz, though she lives elsewhere, said that at 7 a.m., her parents called to tell her that “terrorists” were in the kibbutz. She did not hear from them again that day. The next morning, she drove to Nir Oz to find them. She described the scene as she arrived: “It looked like something out of a movie. There were lots of burned cars and motorcycles and burning fields and houses. The entire neighborhood of my parents was burned.”

In her parents’ home, Benezra discovered that many of their possessions were missing, but she found the phone of her mother, Adina Moshe, 72, which contained messages Adina had sent to a friend at 9:31 and at 9:44 a.m. on October 7, saying gunmen had fired at the house and seriously injured her husband, Benezra’s father, Said Moshe, 75. Benezra found his body on the floor. “My father had been wearing a white shirt—by Sunday it was all brown, dried blood brown,” Benezra said. “He was lying in a position as if he had been holding the door.”

Benezra saw bullet holes in the walls and windows. She also said it looked like the attackers had used explosives to blow through the metal bars on the safe room windows, which is how they seem to have entered. The door to the house was still locked from the inside when Benezra arrived.

On Saturday [October 7]… they started to get WhatsApp messages from the security team of the kibbutz saying [close] your safe rooms and stay inside because there might be a penetration. And then the terrorists arrived …. they tried to break into the safe room, but my father had barricaded the door. He was helping his wife to hide behind a small sofa in the safe room. When they came back a second time, he came out of the safe room so they wouldn’t force their way in and find her.

Footage of Abuses

Sderot

Early morning attacks

Denino said minutes later she saw 15 gunmen out of the window:

Most were wearing black uniforms, like army or military. All of them had a long gun, an AK, I think. Two had RPGs. All were wearing bulletproof vests, three were wearing green headbands. They were shouting. A group of 10 came together, and then split up at the roundabout, going in different directions, and then another five came.

Denino tried to call the police and others, including her cousin, who told her to keep quiet. She said she did not want to stay in the safe room because being there was distressing for her son. She described what she saw through the shutters:

There are small villas behind my house and the first group of 10 [gunmen] were trying to open each house, and if they heard a noise, they opened fire in that direction. Two of them managed to get through the gate of one house behind my building. They got upset that there were bars on the window, so they put their guns through the bars and opened fire. I don’t know if anyone was inside.

She said the second group of five entered an apartment building in front of her house:

[T]hey tried to open doors. They saw two [Israeli] civilians with guns who tried to help protect that building. Then two policemen arrived and almost shot the civilians by accident. I don’t know what happened to all of them. … I was checking to make sure they weren’t coming close to our building. They kept going from one house to another. Then it was silent for a while.

Denino went downstairs to lock the main door of the building and blocked the door with some planks of wood. She then brought another family living in her building to her own apartment and tried to calm everyone down.

Khazan said:

We closed all the windows and shutters and made it all dark. We put a cabinet in front of the door to block it from opening, and we went into the safe room. There was shooting everywhere and [there were] sirens all the time. My cousin who is a cop was calling us and telling us, ‘Don’t move, the situation is very severe.’ Her husband had been en route to Sderot and was shot at in his car. The car was full of glass. Somehow, he was able to drive off in a different direction.

[A] friend was driving in front of us in a white Toyota. I was in the car with [another] friend, and my little brother was in the car behind us, a Toyota RAV4. Suddenly the Toyota stopped, made a U-turn, and as it did, it got shot up with bullets. I screamed at my friend to make a U-turn. My brother kept driving straight and his car was totally shot up. We were getting bullets from behind.

As the group arrived back in Sderot, from a distance they saw gunmen with assault rifles in white trucks. Ohana made it home, and into his safe room with his family. From there he was able to watch the live feed of the CCTV camera he had installed at the front of his house.

Ohana said through the feed he saw gunmen shoot Yossi, a neighbor, who was walking in the street toward the synagogue. Yossi fell into a coma but eventually recovered, Ohana told Human Rights Watch in an April 2024 message. Ohana said gunmen shot another neighbor, an older man, on his porch. Ohana said one friend living in an apartment building managed to render the elevator inoperable as a way of protecting those living upstairs from attackers.

Attack on the police station

Killings on the intersection of Highway 34 and Route 232

Killings on the intersection of Menachem Begin and Jerusalem Roads

Kibbutz Alumim

Experiences of Nepali and Thai Workers and Students

When fighters took the group of Thai men out, they also took Bipin Joshi, the Nepali. Five of the injured Nepalis bled to death over the subsequent hours. Kattel said that after the first spray of gunfire, Ashish Chaudhary, who had also been hit, moved slightly, so a gunman fired at him again, killing him. Kattel was shot in both shoulders and a hand and had four broken ribs. He spent the next six hours holding a jacket over his wounds, trying to stem the bleeding.

Pramod K.C., the only Nepali student who was unharmed during the attack, had hidden in a kitchen cabinet. Birendra Chaudhary, who had hidden in the oven, was injured only slightly.

He said the gunmen were in military uniforms with green headbands, carrying AK-style assault rifles and an RPG launcher.

They asked him where he was from. And the guy said he was not the boss, but that he was just a Thai worker. … When the guy said he was Thai and not the boss, the soldiers just started shooting nonstop while shouting ‘Allahu akbar!’

They killed the man. Then Kaeokoed realized that the room next to his was on fire:

I thought I wouldn’t make it, so I sent a text to my partner [in Thailand], saying that I would not return home and that there was a Gaza militant raid, and they have killed a lot of Thai and Nepali people. I was losing it. I also texted an Arab friend and asked him to inform the boss. 

The fire did not spread to his room, and he stayed there hidden for the rest of the day. “At about 3 p.m.,” he said, “my [mobile] connection was lost so I didn’t know who survived and who didn’t.”

Israeli Armed Forces’ Response

Moshav Netiv Ha’asara

Zikim Beach

The Zikim beach area, a broad sandy beach with dunes, extends north for several kilometers from the border with Gaza. Just over two kilometers north of Gaza there are gazebos, restrooms, and a large parking lot. There is also a large Israeli military base less than two kilometers to the north of Gaza and about 400 meters to the east of the water’s edge.

They found a spot about 800 meters from a closed gate that prevented them from driving further down the beach and required them to park their cars right next to the military base. Lior Alush, 24, a student and a waitress at the restaurant, said she arrived that night and parked her car near the Zikim base. Alush and Ben Yitzchak said they partied until early morning. Sometime between 4 and 5:30 a.m., people went to sleep. “Everyone sleeping together under the sky,” Ben Yitzchak said. “Fifteen people lying next to each other.” Then everything changed. Ben Yitzchak remembers waking up confused:

I remember in the morning—I don’t remember what time—there was a thin layer of blue in the sky and everything else [was] black. I woke up from a hard blast. I thought to myself it was a joke, like maybe the guys had made the blast with the speakers. I thought it wasn’t funny, then I heard the Iron Dome and I understood it’s not a joke. Everyone woke up and we sought cover between two shipping containers. Everyone just sitting together and hugging together.

Shortly after the gunfire started, Alush and Ben Yitzchak’s group decided to run back to their vehicles and the military base. “It was awful,” Ben Yitzchak said. “When people run for their lives, they fall, and they are screaming. And it’s an awful feeling I can’t describe.” Ben Yitzchak said he heard the whistling of the bullets, which were coming from the direction of the sea.

About 20 people from the party reached the gate of the military base. There they pleaded with the soldiers at the gate to let them in so that they could take shelter. The soldiers eventually let them in. Ben Yitzchak said he could hear the chaos unfolding on the soldiers’ radios: “We’re hearing on the radio people dying, screaming, shooting, wanting ammo, wanting backup. You just don’t know what to do,” Ben Yitzchak said. “Some people were calling their families and telling them they love them, and that they were sorry.”

As the gunfire came closer, some decided to flee in their cars. Ben Yitzchak said he was in the first car to leave. He didn’t have his keys, so he got into someone else’s car. Another man and a woman joined them.

The four were able to make it to Highway Number 4 and sped away from the beach for one to two minutes before Ben Yitzchak said they encountered a stopped white van and a man lying on his stomach on the ground. Ben Yitzchak said that at that moment they were fired upon from multiple directions, including from the fields alongside the road and from the white van. Fearing they would surely be killed if they turned around, they sped toward the car. Ben Yitzchak said they all crouched as low as possible and sped toward the vehicle in an attempt to get past it. Ben Yitzchak and the driver were shot, Ben Yitzchak in the lower left leg. They kept driving for several minutes, but the car broke down and they were forced to abandon it.

The four hid in the bushes until they saw an Israeli military truck. They waved to it, and it stopped to come to their aid. Ben Yitzchak said the soldiers applied a tourniquet to his leg and that they wrote the time, 8:50, on him.

Some at the base eventually also attempted to flee but were told to turn back by friends who had also tried to flee. A soldier at the base helped defend the nine partygoers who remained outside the base until Israeli armored vehicles arrived at the base around 2:30 p.m. to escort them out, Alush said.

Alush was able to drive her own car out of the beach area and described horrific scenes: “All the way home I saw dead bodies along the way. I feel like I‘m doing a driving test but navigating through bodies… I think I saw five bodies of terrorists on the beach. When I got away from the beach, I saw the bodies of three civilians on the way home.” 

Kibbutz Holit

They stayed in that house for hours, hearing gunfire and gunmen shouting, “Who is this?” in Hebrew. They did not trust messages they received saying that Israeli armed forces were in Holit until someone sent them a picture of a special unit and women belonging to the unit came to their door.

Azulay said her car was the only one in the kibbutz that survived the attack undamaged. That night, she drove it to Kibbutz Gvulot nearby. “We saw a horror movie on the road. … I saw bodies and burned cars. … When we reached Kibbutz Gvulot, it looked like a refugee camp of Holit.”

Dhaham said that another Palestinian Bedouin relative, also working in Holit, told him that attackers had stopped him as he tried to flee in his car. The man told Dhaham, “I told them, ‘I am Muslim like you.’ They said, ‘No, you are kufaar [a derogatory term for non-Muslims], you are Jewish, we need to kill you.’” As this was going on, the relative said, the military was firing on the attackers and, in the chaos, he was able to escape.

Kibbutz Kissufim

Human Rights Watch interviewed a survivor of the attack on Kibbutz Kissufim and reviewed media reports about the attack.

Raanan said Israeli soldiers arrived in the late afternoon or early evening and told people to remain in the shelter, returning early the next morning to evacuate them.

Kibbutz Nahal Oz

Survivors said the attack began with the sound of rockets, followed by gunfire, grenades, and RPGs. Some residents had no electricity in their homes or shelters from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., and the internet and phones also appear to have functioned only sporadically.

Kibbutz Mefalsim

Human Rights Watch interviewed a survivor of the attack on Kibbutz Mefalsim and a survivor from Nir Oz whose brother was attacked near Mefalsim and verified videos and reviewed media reports related to the attack.

Simcha went outside the gate at some point, and said it looked like the scene from an “apocalyptic zombie movie”:

Cars were destroyed. Burned. There were bodies lying around the road. What made me furious was, it was obvious [to me] that most [of the dead] were civilians. … There were cars as far as the eye could see. You could see bodies. … Lying around in ditches, bodies burning in cars. There were bullet holes all over the cars. To the right of the gate were dozens of bodies. To the left, the same thing.

Simcha said there were 10 dead civilians at the gate and that at some point the kibbutz team regained control of the gate. “It was obvious [to me] that these were not combatants, you know, they were wearing colors and they just came out from a festival. We tried to understand if there was something we could do for them. The only thing to do was cover them up so people wouldn’t see them.”

Even before October 7, Mefalsim had problems with electricity and communications because its infrastructure had not kept pace with the growth of the kibbutz, according to Simcha. Ten minutes after the attack began, the problems worsened, making it harder for those under threat to communicate and coordinate. “[The gunmen] hit a generator, and it flipped the switch, even [for] land lines..”

Kibbutz residents found two-way radio units on the bodies of dead gunmen, Simcha said.

Kibbutz Nir Am

The armed attack on Kibbutz Nir Am killed at least nine civilians at the kibbutz and eight at a nearby junction.

Nabil al-Barawi, a Palestinian from Gaza who worked for Liberman as the head of a lemon and grapefruit plantation, said that at around 6:15 a.m., a Palestinian Bedouin bus driver had dropped him and three other colleagues at the plantation in Nir Am, and then dropped seven other Palestinian workers at nearby Kibbutz Yad Mordechai, where they also worked in agriculture. Because of the rocket attacks, Yael, the Yad Mordechai team’s employer, called Nabil and told him the driver should drive all of them back to Rahat, the nearby city where the workers resided. As Nabil, his 10 colleagues, and the driver were leaving Nir Am, someone in a white jeep fired dozens of bullets at them before driving on. Nabil said the driver and three colleagues were lightly injured in the attack. They then drove back to the plantation, where they sought refuge until about 6 p.m., when Liberman and the military came and evacuated them.

Moshav Yesha and Moshav Mivtahim

Patkin said:

Kibbutz Re’im

Cohen said that she, her husband, and two children were in their safe room with the door locked for 26 hours. They were following the news on their computer and also heard shooting and shouting in Arabic outside.

At one point, someone entered their house. Then, at 10 or 11 a.m., someone knocked on the door of their safe room. “They said they were soldiers,” Cohen said. “I asked what unit, and they said the name of a unit in Hebrew. I said, ‘Who is your contact person in the kibbutz?’ And they didn’t know the name. They tried to force open the door, but we kept it closed and they left.”

Cohen said that sometime in the evening, a munition struck and damaged the roof of the safe room and the water heater on top.

The UN Special Representative on sexual violence in conflict found that:

Kibbutz Nir Yitzhak

One gunman led the Rosens to a hole in the fence at the edge of Nir Yitzhak and told the injured couple to go through with some men. Moshe said:

Kibbutz Nirim

Human Rights Watch interviewed seven kibbutz members and the support provider of an eighth member about the attack.

My ears were ringing from the gunshots, so I had to ask my daughter to listen for anyone coming back while I stayed the whole time kneeling in front of the safe room door with the gun pointing at it. At the same time, I was seeing messages from friends saying, ‘There are terrorists in our house.’ I tried to send messages warning friends on the other side of our neighborhood, but [on my phone] I saw only one tick mark next to my messages [showing the message had been sent but not delivered], so assumed they had been taken or killed.

Jesalva brought Hefetz to the safe room, but the door did not close properly—something Jesalva said she had flagged for the maintenance staff of the kibbutz a year earlier. Because of her condition, Hefetz did not realize the danger they were in and continued to speak loudly, asking for something to eat. Fearing that Hefetz would get upset if she did not get her something to eat, Jesalva ran to the kitchen amidst gunfire to grab some cookies. Soon after, Hefetz asked for a medical device, and again Jesalva ran out to get it for her, fearing that if she did not, Hefetz would become agitated and attract attention.

Over the next few hours, Jesalva heard two groups of people entering and leaving the house. Then a third group came, and she heard people opening cabinets and smashing things. After a while a slim man in civilian dress and with no visible weapon opened the door to the safe room. Jesalva described what happened:

He turned the flashlight of his phone on. Nitza wakes up and starts shouting at him, ‘Why are you here? Why don’t you close the door, Camille. Why don’t you get out of here!’ in Hebrew. I asked her to be quiet. If she had been able to walk, she would have attacked him. I put my hands up and said, ‘Sorry, sir, she is old, she doesn’t know anything, please be patient.’ He calmed down, he asked where the money was, and then he saw my phone. He took my phone and saw a picture of my son and me. He asked again, ‘Where is the money?’ I opened my wallet and handed him all my money, and said, ‘This is all, but please don’t take my passport and my residency card.’ I was calm but shaking. And then he turned his back, and he asked in Hebrew, ‘What do you have here?’ looking at the cabinets. He ended up leaving. I followed him, and I said, ‘Thank you sir, I am going to close the door now.’ He nodded. I closed the door, and I hugged Nitza. She felt my fear.

Kibbutz Ein HaShlosha

The fighters set fire to homes. “The houses burned were closest to the hole in the fence [in the south, through which the attackers entered],” Nathan said. “The assailants threw a grenade into at least three houses and every underground bunker. [We] found unexploded grenades … [with] no pins and their spools undone.”

Nathan said he also saw four piles of large propane tanks in the southern end of his kibbutz. “[The gunmen] tried to put them in the houses. We found [the tanks] set next to the houses. They shot at propane tanks, some didn’t explode. Sometimes they thew a grenade in to explode the tank.”

Kibbutz Sufa

The armed attack on Kibbutz Sufa killed three civilians, including a member of the rapid response team, during a firefight that lasted hours.

Kibbutz Kerem Shalom

Kibbutz Erez

Human Rights Watch interviewed two members of the rapid response team about the attack on Kibbutz Erez.

Kibbutz Magen

Arar realized that the gunfire had killed his wife and the other man in the car, as well as the driver of the second car. He took his 8-month-old son, Elias, who was in the back seat and hid with him in an electricity junction box on the side of the road. He called police and military contacts, pleading for them to rescue him.

Over the next five hours or so, peering through bullet holes in the metal doors, Arar said he saw the fighters using the intersection as a dispatch point, with different groups of gunmen passing through in trucks heading north, at least one with a large weapon mounted on the back, and then sometime later returning, and men on motorbikes carrying what he recognized as AK-style assault rifles and RPGs heading in different directions. Arar saw four fighters manning the intersection open fire on and kill a lone Israeli soldier in a car. He said they stopped two men driving in a taxi who were yelling out that they were Arabs. He said two of the fighters went up to them on either side of the car and shot them in the head.

He stayed in the box for about six hours, before Israeli military forces approached the intersection. As they did, four fighters were hiding behind the junction box, waiting in ambush. Though the Israeli forces opened fire on the box, Arar and his son survived.

Kibbutz Sa’ad

Zivan said:

If authentic, the document would indicate that the attackers had information on the unit responsible for protecting the kibbutz and how the kibbutz was guarded. It identifies some important areas in the kibbutz, such as the secretariat, which it says is a communication and contact link “among internal entities in the kibbutz as well as with external entities” and “a very important source of information for our forces.” It identifies the kitchen and “fortified space” as “suitable for keeping hostages.” The document directs that the guards inside the “guarding room” should be “neutralized.”

The document details how the attack is to be carried out. “Two combat groups”—what it also calls reduced platoons—each consisting of a four-wheel drive Jeep and four motorcycles, were to drive in a 125-meter-long convoy in a formation of two motorcycles-Jeep-two motorcycles. Two diagrams show the configuration and distance between the vehicles, one for the motorcycles and the other for the jeeps, and notes that, “the number of Jeeps will be completed with specialized members.”

The memo lays out the route, naming streets the fighters should take and where to breach the kibbutz fence. Once inside, the document reads, “the first [group] will take control of the eastern part of the kibbutz while the other takes control of the western part, inflicting as many human losses as possible and capturing hostages (and take some of them to the Gaza Strip in various vehicles).”

Kibbutz Yad Mordechai

Human Rights Watch interviewed a resident of the kibbutz who was present during the attack.

Pasi, who lived alone and was on the security team, said she then went to the safe room and stayed there, contacting others so they could alert the community. “We didn’t know exactly what was going on. I heard terrorists were trying to enter and assumed the military would be there. But then we realized it was something completely different.”

Kibbutz residents gathered in the large community shelter, and the rapid response team went to the fence where Pasi said there were about eight motorcycles. “There is a military base right at the entrance of the kibbutz. They were able to immediately engage [the gunmen] and that’s what protected the kibbutz. They fought on the road by the main gate and by the cow shed by the south side gate. This was at about 9 or 10 a.m.”

Pasi continued to share information with other residents until 10 p.m., after which they were evacuated.

Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

Human Rights Watch did not document any cases of rape but, owing to the methodological and ethical challenges set forth below, does not take this to mean that they did not occur.

Human Rights Watch research yielded evidence that members of Palestinian armed groups committed acts of sexual and gender-based violence during the attacks, including acts of forced nudity, and posting of sexualized images without consent on social media. First responders and people caring for the bodies of the dead described to Human Rights Watch seeing bodies in conditions and circumstances they believe were indicative of the deceased having been victims of sexual violence. A report by the UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict stated that that were “reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related sexual violence occurred during the 7 October attacks in multiple locations across Gaza periphery, including rape and gang rape, in at least three locations.”

This section of the report contains information related to the overall issue of sexual and gender-based violence during the attacks and information regarding incidents not already referenced in the discussion of specific attack locations above.

Human Rights Watch investigated allegations of gender-based violence, including sexual violence, during the October 7 assault by interviewing first responders, and experts on sexual violence who provided information about the context, and reviewing images captured during the assault. Human Rights Watch also attempted to contact and interview people who survived or witnessed acts of sexual and gender-based violence during the attacks. We did so in accordance with our internal ethical guidelines on informed consent and avoiding re-traumatization.

The Special Representative on sexual violence in conflict stated in her report that in her team’s “medicolegal assessment” of images documenting the attacks:

a few corpses with conspicuously spread legs were observed. These postures could not be adequately explained by, for instance, “postmortem pugilistic posturing” due to burn damage. The reviewed photographs and videos further revealed a minimum of twenty corpses with partially or fully exposed intimate body parts such as breasts and genitalia, resulting from the absence, displacement, or tearing of clothing. Also, at least ten distinct corpses displayed indications of bound wrists and/or tied legs.

The Special Representative wrote that, “Although circumstantial, such a pattern of undressing and restraining of victims may be indicative of some forms of sexual violence.”

The Special Representative also found “clear and convincing information… based on the first-hand accounts of released hostages… that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment occurred against some women and children during their time in captivity and has reasonable grounds to believe that this violence may be ongoing.”

Israeli Government Statements and Responses

International Responses

Additional Information Regarding Possible Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

Information related to sexual and gender-based violence is included above in the sections of this report discussing the attacks at the Supernova site, Kibbutz Be’eri, Kibbutz Kfar Aza, Kibbutz Nahal Oz, and Kibbutz Re’im. The information below is included here because it is not linked to any of the specific locations discussed in the earlier sections of this report.

Human Rights Watch has not independently corroborated accounts provided to the media.

Barriers to Documenting Sexual Violence

The International Committee for the Red Cross has said:

These factors contribute to low rates of survivors of sexual violence reporting the crimes committed against them to law enforcement. Many of these factors could affect whether survivors of sexual violence on October 7 have spoken or will speak about their experiences. But the difficulties of documenting crimes of sexual violence committed during the assault on October 7 are also compounded by additional complexities specific to this situation.

The people taken hostage may also include people who witnessed or experienced sexual violence during the attacks on October 7, whose accounts were also unavailable during their captivity. For hostages, the trauma of kidnap and experiences during captivity may also have created additional barriers to them recounting what they experienced or saw on October 7.

Collection of Evidence

Because of the large number of victims, Israeli authorities did not systematically conduct forensic analysis of the crime scenes or conduct forensic medical examinations of those killed during the attacks. While this is understandable given the scale of the assault, number of victims, and the desire to identify victims and return them to their families, this has meant a significant impediment to investigators attempting to determine the full scale and nature of the range of abuses committed on October 7 and the context in which they occurred.

At some attack sites, the Israeli armed forces battled Palestinian fighters for hours, and in some cases days. ZAKA members described collecting and removing the remains of victims of the assault in the immediate aftermath, prior to any forensic investigation.

One ZAKA member said:

Initially the collection of bodies focused on victims. The collection of remains of the attackers was not done until later.

Hamas’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, led the assault on October 7. However, other Palestinian armed groups from Gaza participated in the attack. By geolocating 47 videos and analyzing the emblems and colored headbands worn by attackers in them and the Telegram channels on which content was posted, Human Rights Watch identified at least four other armed groups involved. Two additional groups claimed via their official Telegram channel to have participated in the assault, although Human Rights Watch was unable to verify their participation.

The five Palestinian armed groups that Human Rights Watch confirmed to have participated in the attacks are: Hamas’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades; the Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s armed wing, the Quds Brigades; the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine’s armed wing, the National Resistance Brigades or Omar al-Qasim Forces; the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine’s armed wing, the Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades; and the Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, formerly linked to the Fatah political faction.

We confirmed these groups’ participation in large part through an analysis of the attackers visible in videos taken during the attacks, including CCTV and body camera footage. This included footage of some fighters wearing colored headbands linked to specific armed groups. It also included footage posted on the Telegram social media channels belonging to specific armed groups which showed evidence of abuse, with the captions claiming responsibility for the depicted acts of abuse.

The National Resistance Brigades, Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, and Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades shared fewer videos of their members’ actions on their Telegram channels and rarely appeared in other videos of the assault. The limited number of videos of these groups that Human Rights Watch analyzed were recorded hours after the assault began.

Mere participation in the attack on Israel on October is not a violation of international humanitarian law, but fighters identifiable as affiliated with the Qassam Brigades, the Quds Brigades, the Aqsa Martyrs, and the National Resistance Brigades, all committed serious abuses of the laws of war, as did individuals whose affiliation was unclear or who were civilians from Gaza directly participating in the hostilities.

The Qassam Brigades

Armed Groups’ Presence During the Assault

Content circulated on the armed groups’ Telegram channels and other social media platforms confirms that the Qassam Brigades was the most active group. Human Rights Watch identified fighters wearing apparel associated with the Qassam Brigades in 39 videos in 14 locations, including: Be’eri, Sufa, the Erez crossing, Ein Hashlosha, Kerem Shalom, Re’im, the Supernova music festival, Sderot, Alumim, Kissufim, Nirim, Nahal Oz, Kfar Aza, and the Pega military camp. The content shows Qassam Brigades fighters deliberately killing civilians, taking hostages, and setting houses on fire, mostly in the early morning on October 7. Nine videos also show the Qassam Brigades leading the attacks that breach the barrier separating Gaza from Israel, targeting military outposts near Kerem Shalom, Sufa, Nirim, the Erez crossing, and Pega military base, and attacking Israeli security forces.

In addition, Human Rights Watch verified four videos that indicate Qassam Brigades fighters participated in attacks on Nir Oz, the Nahal Oz military base, and Zikim beach. These videos do not clearly show attackers wearing the group’s attire, but they were published on the official Qassam Brigades Telegram channel, suggesting the group’s involvement in those incidents. All four videos show attackers either breaching Israeli defenses, attacking Israeli military bases, or, in the case of Zikim beach, landing boats on Israel’s coast.

Coordination Between Armed Groups

Fighters’ Dress, Weapons, and Equipment

Interviewees told Human Rights Watch that those participating in the assault on October 7 were wearing a combination of camouflage, black or olive green uniforms, or Israeli military uniforms or copies of them. Most said the fighters wore black vests used to carry ammunition and equipment, which many assumed to be body armor. Videos verified by Human Rights Watch show attackers wearing various green, brown and black camouflage patterns, or solid green, brown or black uniforms, and green, brown or black vests. Many fighters wore civilian clothing with vests and carried backpacks. The clothing varied within and between locations.

Human Rights Watch has found that on October 7, 2023, the Qassam Brigades and other Palestinian armed groups committed numerous serious violations of international humanitarian law—the laws of war—during attacks on civilians in Israel. They carried out deliberate and indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian objects, unlawful killings, torture and cruel treatment, sexual and gender-based violence, mutilation and despoiling of bodies, hostage-taking, destruction of civilian property, and pillage. Palestinian armed groups were also responsible for attacking medical transport, and the use of human shields.

Those who committed these serious violations with criminal intent are responsible for war crimes. Human Rights Watch has concluded that Palestinian armed groups committed the crimes against humanity of murder and imprisonment of civilians in violation of fundamental rules of international law on October 7. The murder and unlawful imprisonment were committed as part of a widespread and systematic “attack directed against a civilian population,” pursuant to an organizational policy to plan and commit multiple criminal acts including murder and unlawful imprisonment.

Based on the evidence set out in this report, Human Rights Watch calls for the investigation of other crimes against humanity, including extermination, rape or other sexual violence, and persecution should be investigated. Such criminal acts committed on October 7 will amount to crimes against humanity if they formed part of the attack directed against a civilian population.

Criminal Liability

The serious abuses carried out by Qassam Brigades and other Palestinian armed group fighters on October 7 appeared to have been directed if not ordered by more senior commanders. Senior Qassam Brigades commanders planned to take hostages and kill and ill-treat civilians—and the fighters did this.

On May 20, 2024, Khan announced he was seeking arrest warrants for three Hamas leaders, Yahya Sinwar, head of Hamas in Gaza; Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri, commander-in-chief of the Qassam Brigades; and Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas Political Bureau, and two Israeli leaders, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu; and Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant.

Crimes Against Humanity Framework

In determining whether criminal acts were committed “as part” of the “attack” directed against a civilian population, the ICC has indicated that relevant considerations include the characteristics, aims, nature and consequences of the acts, and their temporal and geographical proximity. Isolated or random acts that are not part of the attack will not amount to crimes against humanity.

The nature of the abuses, their broad-based character, and their frequency (rather than the actions of individual security forces and personnel) constitute the relevant factors to assess whether the acts are reflective of a policy.

Information around the planning of the October 7 assault and crimes committed that day, the way in which the assault was launched, and the statements of intent made on that day and in the weeks afterwards all crystalize the methodical planning of the attacks and some of the ensuing abuses. Evidence showing the planning of criminal acts would be clear—but not the only—evidence that indicates an organizational policy to commit the attack directed against a civilian population.

Planning

Core to the plans was the taking of hostages, as made clear by numerous statements by the Hamas leadership on and after October 7.

Statements of Planning, Organization and Clarification

Hamas leaders have made misleading and sometimes contradictory statements to deflect responsibility for attacks against civilians, as noted below. However, statements made during the assault and caught on camera, as well as in purported planning documents, clearly reveal that aspects of perpetrating abuses were integral to the assault, including to take and hold hostages; to kill civilians; and to use methods amounting to torture and cruel treatment.

As the attacks were unfolding on October 7, the deputy chairman of the Hamas political bureau, Saleh al-Arouri, who was killed three months later, acknowledged the aim of taking people hostage in an appearance on Al Jazeera, but he attempted to distance the armed group from other aspects of the assault:

Despite these claims, on October 7 the Qassam Brigades unlawfully killed many civilians, as Human Rights Watch has documented.

War Crimes Framework

International humanitarian law recognizes the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza as an ongoing armed conflict. The hostilities between Israel and Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups are governed by international humanitarian law for non-international armed conflicts, which are rooted in international treaty law, most notably Common Article 3 to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, and customary international humanitarian law. These rules concern the methods and means of combat and fundamental protections for civilians and for combatants no longer participating in hostilities and apply to both states and non-state armed groups.

The foremost principle of international humanitarian law is that parties to a conflict must distinguish at all times between combatants and civilians. Civilians may never be the target of attack. Attacks that deliberately target civilians or fail to discriminate between combatants and civilians, or that would cause disproportionate harm to the civilian population compared to the anticipated military gain, are prohibited.

Common Article 3 provides a number of fundamental protections for civilians and captured or incapacitated combatants. Violence against such persons—notably murder, cruel treatment, and torture—is prohibited, as well as outrages against their personal dignity and degrading or humiliating treatment, and the taking of hostages.

Serious violations of the laws of war that are committed with criminal intent—deliberately or recklessly — are war crimes. War crimes, listed in the “grave breaches” provisions of the Geneva Conventions and as customary law, include a wide array of offenses, including deliberate, indiscriminate, and disproportionate attacks harming civilians and civilian objects, torture and other ill-treatment, hostage-taking, and using human shields, among others. Individuals also may be held criminally liable for attempting to commit a war crime, as well as assisting in, facilitating, aiding, or abetting a war crime.

Criminal responsibility also may fall on persons planning or instigating the commission of a war crime. In addition, commanders and civilian leaders may be prosecuted for war crimes as a matter of command responsibility when they knew or should have known about the commission of war crimes and took insufficient measures to prevent them or punish those responsible.

States have an obligation to investigate and appropriately prosecute individuals within their territory implicated in war crimes. International humanitarian law does not place an obligation on non-state armed groups to prosecute violators of war crimes. They should, however, take appropriate disciplinary measures to ensure compliance with the laws of war within their ranks. When they do conduct trials, they need to do so in accordance with international fair trial standards.

War Crimes on October 7

Attacks Against Civilians and Civilian Objects

Parties to a conflict must take all feasible precautions to ensure that a target of attack is a military objective and not a civilian object. Attacks intentionally targeting civilians or civilian objects are prohibited. Even where a valid military target is present, attacks must discriminate adequately between military and civilian objects, and they must not be disproportionate—that is, the expected harm they cause to civilians must not be excessive compared with the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated. Individuals who order or carry out unlawful attacks with criminal intent—that is, deliberately or recklessly—are responsible for war crimes.

Human Rights Watch verified 19 videos and 9 photographs documenting damage and destruction done to private property that appeared to be carried out deliberately and not as part of operations targeting military objectives. Armed groups damaged and destroyed homes through the use of arson, RPG attacks, grenade attacks, and gunfire.

Deliberate Killings

Through witness statements and photography and video content reviewed, Human Rights Watch documented dozens of killings of civilians. Palestinian fighters shot at civilians at close range or while they were trying to flee to or already inside safe rooms—which were designed to provide protection from rocket attacks, not ground assaults — and other places people were sheltering, and at unsuspecting drivers. They also hurled grenades into shelters and fired RPGs at homes. They set houses on fire that burned civilians to death, and forced others out of homes where they killed or captured them.

The largest number of civilians killed on October 7 were festivalgoers. Palestinian fighters killed many by gunfire on the festival grounds or as they were fleeing. Others were shot in their kibbutz, often inside their homes as they were sheltering in safe rooms. Fighters killed and wounded many by firing through the doors of safe rooms, used explosives to open doors, or threw grenades into homes. In some cases, fighters fired RPGs directly at people’s homes while civilians were sheltering inside. The fighters killed civilians who were trying to run away or attempted to escape by car.

In the video content that Human Rights Watch verified and analyzed, many of the fighters seen killing civilians appeared to be members of the Qassam Brigades. This conclusion is based on the headbands the fighters were wearing in videos or because the videos appeared in the Qassam Brigades’ Telegram channel on which they claimed responsibility for the acts shown.

Two apparent Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades’ planning documents, if proven authentic, would also demonstrate that killing civilians was part of the armed groups’ plan and not simply an outcome of a chaotic set of attacks, despite some statements from Hamas spokespersons subsequent to the assault claiming the attacks aimed only to target Israeli military personnel and to take hostages.

Human Rights Watch examined two documents reportedly found by Israeli authorities at the site of the attacks, including in a vehicle used by fighters. One is titled “hostage detention plan,” watermarked as an Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades’ operational manual. It says forces should: “Kill any person who might pose a threat or a nuisance”; “Cause shock by using bullets, stun grenades, indirect threats, electric shocks, violent and terrorizing treatment, and killing, if absolutely necessary”; and “Kill those expected to resist or those who pose a threat.”

Torture and Cruel Treatment

Palestinian fighters, according to witness accounts and verified videos, tortured or otherwise cruelly treated people in their custody.

Hostage Taking

The April 14 Hamas letter to Human Rights Watch does not confirm the number of people that Hamas had taken hostage nor the number still alive. Hamas rejects the term “hostage” being applied to those being held in Gaza since October 7, saying that it had “expressed more than once that it did not insist on holding” the civilians taken on October 7 and had been prepared to release them in the first few days after the assault. It blames “Israeli aggression,” refusal to meet certain terms, and “procrastination,” for this failing to happen. None of these assertions justify the taking of hostages under international law.

The Hamas letter states that as of March 10, 70 hostages, whom it refers to as “detainees,” had died as a result of Israeli military operations in Gaza, and said more may die of famine and the lack of healthcare services. It claims that Hamas is taking great efforts to ensure that those it is holding have access to food, water and medical care, including for chronic illnesses, and are being held in humane conditions. The letter acknowledges that other armed groups are holding people in Gaza but did not provide a number.

Ill-Treatment of Hostages on October 7

International humanitarian law requires that anyone taken into custody be treated humanely. The watermarked “hostage detention plan,” as reported by media sources, tells assailants to: “Place hostages away from means of resistance and suicide, tie the hostages up and blindfold them, sort them and isolate them (women and children—men)” and “Tie up some hostages around the site and use them as human shields, making sure they are clearly visible.”

There have been numerous reports of the mistreatment of hostages after they were taken to Gaza, including by hostages who have since been released. This report is limited to the actions and abuses that took place on October 7.

Crimes Related to Acts of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

Mutilation and Despoiling of Bodies

Human Rights Watch has identified at least five cases in which Palestinian fighters or accompanying civilians mutilated the bodies of the dead. There were additional cases in which fighters despoiled (robbed) the dead.

Use of Human Shields on October 7

Human Rights Watch identified at least two instances in which Palestinian fighters appeared to use civilians as human shields during the October 7 assault.

Pillage and Destruction of Property

Many witnesses described Palestinian fighters and apparent civilians from Gaza carry out pillage during the assault. During the attacks on residential communities, attackers stole personal possessions including money, jewelry, electronics, bicycles, and cars. Human Rights Watch verified 13 videos showing looting by both fighters and people in civilian dress in and around Nir Oz, Sufa, Nir Yitzhak, Be’eri, Magen, and the Supernova Music Festival.

Attacks Against Medical Infrastructure

Hospitals, ambulances, and other medical infrastructure have special protection under international humanitarian law. They must be presumed to be civilian and lose their protection only if they are being used to commit “acts harmful to the enemy,” such as transporting ammunition or healthy fighters. Intentionally attacking medical infrastructure are war crimes.

Crimes Against Humanity on October 7

Under the Rome Statute of the ICC, certain acts are listed as crimes against humanity. These include: murder; extermination; imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law; rape or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity; and persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on racial, ethnic, national, religious or other grounds. Crimes against humanity must be committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against a civilian population.

Human Rights Watch has determined that the Qassam Brigades and other Palestinian armed groups committed multiple acts of murder and unlawful imprisonment of civilians on October 7. These were in furtherance of an organizational policy to commit criminal acts including murder and unlawful imprisonment, and therefore amount to an “attack directed against a civilian population.”

As murder and unlawful imprisonment were committed as part of this attack on October 7, they amount to crimes against humanity.

Human Rights Watch also calls for investigation as to whether the crimes against humanity of extermination, rape and sexual violence, and persecution were committed on October 7.  

This report was researched and written by Belkis Wille, associate crisis, conflict, and arms division director; Robin Taylor, crisis, conflict, and arms division research assistant; and Devon Lum, former research assistant for the Digital Investigations Lab in the Technology, Rights and Investigations Division. Heather Barr, associate women’s rights division director, contributed research and writing.

Anagha Neelakantan, senior crisis, conflict and arms division editor, provided drafting support and edited the report. The report was also edited by Ida Sawyer, crisis, conflict and arms division director, and Eric Goldstein, former deputy Middle East and North Africa (MENA) division director. Clive Baldwin, senior legal advisor, and James Ross, legal and policy director, provided legal review. Tom Porteous, deputy program director, and Sari Bashi, program director, provided programmatic review.

Specialist reviews were provided by Julia Bleckner, senior researcher in the Asia division and global health initiative; Emina Ćerimović, associate director in the disability rights division; Louis Charbonneau, UN director in New York; Philippe Dam, director for EU advocacy; Sam Dubberley, director of the Technology, Rights and Investigations division; Claudio Francavilla, associate director for European Union advocacy; Mark Hiznay, associate director in the crisis, conflict and arms division; Gabriela Ivens, head of open source research for the Digital Investigations Lab in the Technology, Rights and Investigations division; Lucy McKernan, United Nations advocacy deputy director in Geneva; Oryem Nyeko, senior researcher in the Africa division; Sunai Phasuk, senior researcher in the  Asia division; Hilary Power, UN Geneva director; Macarena Sáez, executive director of the women’s rights division; Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director; Bridget Sleap, senior researcher on older people’s rights; Letta Tayler, former associate director in the crisis and conflict division; Bill van Esveld, acting Israel and Palestine associate director; and Sarah Yager, Washington director.

The report was prepared for publication by crisis, conflict and arms division associate, Nīa Knighton; publications officer, Travis Carr; and senior administrative manager, Fitzroy Hepkins.

We would also like to thank Michael Sfard for his review of segments of the report.

We would like to thank the individuals who made this report possible by sharing their experiences with us despite the acute trauma they and their communities were experiencing at the time of the interviews.