Israel war: Ex-Israeli soldier’s shock over Hamas acts

Sydneysider, Avi – who didn’t want his full name to be published – spent four years in the Israeli special forces.

He condemned the atrocities committed by militants, who have reportedly defiled bodies in the weeks since their October 7 attack on Israel.

Speaking to news.com.au, the 41-year-old said he never would have been ordered to carry out such horrific acts during his time in the army.

“Would I have gotten an instruction to go house by house and kill people and cut bodies? Never, not in the worst dream,” he said.

“There is a big, big difference in the barbaric way [things have] happened … They are going house by house, shooting families, shooting kids. The way they treat the bodies … It’s worse than the Holocaust.”

He said the conflict, including the deaths of 1400 Israelis and the abduction of 200 people, is one that will never be forgotten.

“You hear stories, real stories [about the Holocaust] but it’s actually happening now,” he said. “This is what your kids are going to read about it.”

More than 6500 Palestinians, mainly civilians, have been killed across Gaza in relentless Israeli bombardments in retaliation for the attacks by the Palestinian Islamist militant group, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.

Avi’s comments came after Israel’s government showed a 43-minute clip of killings and mutilations committed by Hamas in a private screening for hundreds of foreign journalists earlier this week.

In one shocking clip, Hamas militants were seen lobbing a grenade into a home bomb shelter, killing a father inside, while another showed a militant attempting to use a garden hoe to try to decapitate a man.

The footage, which was captured by security and body cameras worn by fighters, also showed fighters shooting civilians on the road and a man being executed in a living room chair through his screen door.

As the war rages on, Avi said witnessing the aftermath of horrific acts carried out by Hamas will only make Israeli soldiers “stronger”.

“Soldiers over there, they feel that another 9/11 happened in Israel,” he said. “It makes them understand that the protection of Israel is very, very important.”

After serving in the army from the ages of 19 to 23 and witnessing people being killed and injured, Avi’s military days are long behind him.

He’s now a business owner in Sydney, where he lives with his three children and wife, who he met when he moved to Australia in 2004.

Like others in the Israel-Australia community, watching the war unfold back home has left the 41-year-old “devastated” and worried for his family members overseas.

“My friends have lost brothers and sisters … I know one guy that left his wife in a safe room went to grab weapons and they kidnapped his wife and three kids,” he recalled.

Given his military background, Avi requested to return home and join the war effort but he was told he was “not trained and too old already”.

“When you’re not in the army, and you’re not trained for so many years, they are not interested,” he said.

“And there are so many volunteers because it was such a big shock to the community that everybody wants to go and help to protect Israel.”

Instead, he is focusing efforts on the ground in Sydney, where he has distributed 10,000 ‘kidnapped’ posters of 78 people who have been taken hostage in Israel.

The posters, which have been plastered in bus and train stations among other locations around the city, match other posters distributed in cities around the world.

“Some people don’t read the news, because people are busy with life, and unfortunately people forget very fast,” he said.

“I want to educate people and bring awareness that 1400 people have been killed. I want people to stop and ask questions and to open a conversation.”

Avi said he is undeterred by posters taken down in other cities, including in New York where students were caught tearing down posters outside a business school.

“If they tear it down, it’s OK. We will put it back up again to bring awareness.”

He is also urging the Australian government to continue to push for the release of more than 200 hostages in Hamas, four of which have been freed in the last week.

“There are civilians, and they are innocent,” he said. “There is no room for radical groups in modern society around the world.”