Israel: We’ll soon be ready to go in… As airstrikes on Gaza intensify, 300,000 military personnel called up to ‘take out Hamas for good’

Israel stepped up its ferocious airstrikes on Gaza last night – with its armed forces vowing to ‘hunt down and take out’ Hamas.

Several top officials of the terrorist group and around 1,500 of its armed men have already died.

The offensive accelerated after the Israeli Defense Forces finally regained control of its borders yesterday – 72 hours after gunmen pushed through barricades and launched Saturday’s bloody massacre.

More than 300,000 reservists, tanks and military vehicles were mobilized ahead of a widely expected ground invasion.

Thousands of rifles, helmets and vests have been distributed to Israeli citizens in its border communities while hospitals are put on standby for an all-out war.

Speaking to soldiers near the Gaza fence last night, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said: ‘Hamas wanted a change and it will get one. What was in Gaza will be no more. We started the offensive from the air, later we also come from the ground. We are on the offensive. It will only intensify.’ He spoke like:

• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was to meet opposition leaders to discuss a unity government;

• Reservists drafted into active duty swelled the IDF’s ranks to more than 600,000;

• The extent of Hamas’s brutality has been exposed amid allegations that women and babies have been beheaded;

• The Home Secretary has written to chief constables urging them to warn pro-Palestinian slogans could constitute a hate crime;

• President Joe Biden confirmed 14 US citizens were killed and at least 20 taken hostage;

• The FA continued to drag its feet across the illuminated Wembley Arch to show support for the victims of the Hamas atrocity;

• The Board of Deputies of British Jews wrote to the Culture Secretary to complain about BBC coverage of the attacks.

• Last night there were fears of escalation after Israel’s military said a number of shells had been fired from Syrian territory. Syria’s government has not commented.

Blockade Gaza has already been placed under “total siege” and plagued with strikes since Hamas killed 900 people and kidnapped 150 four days ago.

Plumes of smoke and flames continued to rise over the skyline yesterday as the bombing left many roads impassable for emergency crews.

At least 830 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza officials, while entire districts in the densely populated enclave have been leveled and food, power and water cut off. The bombing comes despite a threat from Hamas that it will execute a prisoner every time a Palestinian home is hit without warning.

Israel says it has killed more than 1,500 militants amid fighting along the border since Saturday.

In retaliation, Hamas fired rockets from Gaza towards the port of Ashkelon after warning those living there to leave before 5pm local time. Israeli Iron Dome rockets were launched to intercept the rockets.

Rockets were also fired from southern Lebanon. The IDF said it was responding with artillery fire.

Israel vowed to take its ‘mighty revenge’ on Hamas and warned militants that they had ‘nowhere to hide’ as airstrikes hit more than 1,500 targets. The strikes are said to have killed two senior Hamas officials – Jawad Abu Shammala and Zakaria Abu Maamar, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip. IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said troops were now in “full control” of Israel’s communities around Gaza and on “high alert” near the northern border.

“We will reach them everywhere,” he warned. Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus, another IDF spokesman, told the Mail: ‘We have assembled more than 300,000 reserve soldiers … and as soon as the tactical timing is right, they will begin to implement the objective that the Israeli government, namely to strip Hamas of all its military capabilities.’

He said the army was ‘actively trying to hunt down and take out the Hamas gunmen behind Saturday’s atrocities’. He added: ‘We are hitting Hamas with an intensity we have not done before.

“We are also hunting and trying to find Hamas senior commanders, so-called commanders, in their homes, hideouts, underground, wherever they may be.” IDF phone messages warned Palestinians to flee, signaling an impending raid on the densely populated Gaza Strip. But most Gazans have no way to leave the besieged and blockaded enclave.

The UN said Israeli airstrikes hit homes, schools and UN buildings. Gaza’s health ministry said at least 830 civilians – including seven journalists – have been killed and 4,000 wounded by the airstrikes since Saturday.

More than 180,000 have been made homeless, with many left seeking shelter on the streets or in schools. The morgue in Gaza’s Khan Younis Hospital is said to be overflowing and, with gas and electricity cut off, hospitals have had to ration generators and keep electricity for operating theatres.

Professor Ghasson Abu Sitta, a surgeon, said children made up a ‘large percentage’ of the injured.

Mr Biden condemned Hamas last night and described its attack as “an act of pure evil”. He added: ‘Unfortunately for the Jewish people, this is not new. It brought to the surface painful memories of antisemitism over the past century.

‘Let there be no doubt. The United States has Israel’s back. We will make sure that the Jewish and democratic state of Israel can defend itself, as we have always done.’

Foreign Secretary Antony Blinken will travel to Israel this week to show US support.