Shani Louk is believed to be the woman paraded around Gaza. Photo / Instagram
Shani Louk is believed to be the woman paraded around Gaza. Photo / Instagram
The semi-naked woman who was paraded through the streets in the back of a pick-up truck as Hamas fighters sat on her unmoving form is a German tourist.
A celebrating crowd surrounded the woman and armed men in combat fatigues, who shouted “God is great” from the open back of the truck.
Some in the crowd, which included youngsters, spat on the woman’s body before the truck sped away on a day of unprecedented massacres of Israeli civilians.
The woman was later named as Shani Louk. Louk’s family confirmed they had seen the video but said they “still have some kind of hope” that she had survived.
More than 300 Israelis were killed, with 2000 injured and 100 kidnapped during the surprise assault by the Islamist group.
In a video obtained by German news outlet Bild, Louk’s mother Ricarda said: “This morning my daughter, Shani Nicole Louk, a German citizen, was kidnapped with a group of tourists in southern Israel by Palestinian Hamas.
”We were sent a video in which I could clearly see our daughter unconscious in the car with the Palestinians and them driving around the Gaza Strip,” she said. “I ask you to send us any help or any news. Thank you very much.”
Louk is believed to have been kidnapped from Israel after Hamas fighters infiltrated by air, sea and land. Hundreds of Israelis were killed in the brutal attack and dozens, including members of the Israeli defence forces were taken hostage.
“We recognised her by the tattoos, and she has long dreadlocks,” Tomasin Weintraub Louk, Louk’s cousin, told The Washington Post.
Louk had been attending an outdoor music festival near Kibbutz Urim when militants stormed the area, the Post reported.
Distressing videos of the scene and other attacks spread on social media, as world leaders decried the killing of civilians in bloodshed compared to 9/11.
A stunned Israel launched airstrikes in Gaza in retaliation, with its prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying the country is now at war with Hamas and vowing to inflict an “unprecedented price.”
Latest media reports say at least 600 people were killed and 1500 wounded, making it the deadliest attack in Israel in decades. At least 232 people in the Gaza Strip were killed and 1700 wounded in Israeli strikes, the Palestinian Health Ministry said. Hamas fighters took an unknown number of civilians and soldiers captive into Gaza.
In one video, a crying woman named Noa was loaded onto a motorcycle as she reached out in tears to a man who was being marched with his hands tied behind his back by captors.
She had also been attending a music festival before she was abducted into Gaza.
Hamas released footage of a group of Israeli men lying on a concrete floor in a dark room with their hands also tied behind their backs.
An elderly Israeli woman appears unnaturally calm as she is driven by armed men into the Gaza Strip on a golf cart. Photo / AP
As a bright light was shone on them to expose their faces to the camera, their eyes widened. The men claimed to be soldiers, although not all were in uniform.
A different older woman sat stoically in a chair as a Hamas terrorist, his face covered and a machine gun in his hands, made the victory sign with his fingers.
Palestinians transport a captured Israeli civilian from Kibbutz Kfar Azza into the Gaza Strip. Photo / AP
Meanwhile, a woman described online as an Israeli settler took selfies of herself as she was led away by her kidnappers.
A convoy of Toyota trucks carrying celebrating terrorists were filmed driving into Gaza.
As the crowd rushed towards them, they held their arms and smartphones aloft to film at least one hostage tied up in the back of one of the vehicles.
A bloodied Israeli woman was filmed being taken from the boot of a different jeep by a man with a handgun in what appeared to be the Gaza Strip.
The woman, who had her hands tied behind her back and was bleeding through her trousers, was quickly shoved back into the back seat of the car.
In shaky smartphone footage, taken by terrified Israelis from balconies or the corners of windows, Hamas terrorists were captured walking through the streets.
On one highway, there were four cars and a van, their windscreens and windows shattered by gunfire.
The drivers and passengers sprawled dead on the road amid the broken glass or slumped behind the wheel.
Two cars had crashed into each other, presumably in desperation to escape the terrorist’s bullets.
What appeared to be a woman’s body was some distance away, as if she had been shot while trying to escape.
Terrorists discuss mercy
In one widely circulated video, a terrorist told a family with young children that they would not be killed after breaking into their home. He makes clear if he wanted to kill them, he would have done so already.
The children ask in Hebrew why the men are in their home and why they are shooting guns.
In one clip, Hamas terrorists discuss showing mercy to an Israeli mother and her two children, although it is unclear what happened to the family.
The Israeli government last night confirmed a “significant” number of hostages had been taken.
A group of three Israelis were shown stuffed in the back of a trailer, hugging each other for support amid what appeared to be looted bicycles, as they were taken away into captivity out of Israeli territory.
A terrorist with an automatic weapon opened the door to a building to reveal a pile of bloodied bodies of at least eight Israelis in civilian clothes.
He fired several shots in what appeared to be a cold-blooded execution of one of the wounded people.
Natan Levy, a professional mixed martial artist, posted one image of four dead people, including two elderly victims, lying face down in their own blood at a bullet-pocked bus stop.
Shots at passing cars
A group of heavily armed terrorists were filmed shooting at passing cars from a white truck on a road in Israeli territory from one apartment.
In one photograph, a young woman lay dead on her side in her car, a gaping bullet wound in her side.
A mayor who “went to defend a town” from Hamas attacks on Israel was named as the first to die.
Ofir Liebstein was killed in a shootout with Hamas militants, Shaar Negev council said.
The region borders the north-east of the Gaza Strip. Mr Liebstein wrote on social media that he was “filled with hope for what’s coming” just hours before his death.
In the evening, the police chief of Rahat, a predominantly Arab town in southern Israel, was reported to have been killed.
In Gaza, the local health authorities reported that at least 198 people had been killed, although it was not clear if that number included terrorists as well as civilians.
Scenes of death and destruction also filled social media after Israeli air strikes began to hit the city.
