Members of Israel’s parliament were invited to view a compilation of video footage on Wednesday showing some of the atrocities that Hamas terrorists committed on Oct. 7.
Lawmakers were allowed to view the footage behind closed doors following a request made by Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana to the Israel Defense Forces Spokesperson’s Unit.
The 43-minute-long video, which was previously shown to the foreign press, included footage captured by body cameras worn by Hamas terrorists, security cameras, dashcams, smartphones and social-media accounts.
Likud Party Knesset member Gilat Distel-Atbaryan said the Knesset physician offered MKs anxiety medication before they entered the auditorium. “I held out in the hall for five minutes and then I ran out sobbing and shaking,” she wrote in a post on X (formerly Twitter).
Fellow Likud member Eli Dallal left after 10 minutes, he said. “After briefly watching such atrocities, I say unequivocally: Revenge is needed and a resurgence of Hamas cannot be allowed,” Dallal wrote on X.
“Remember what Amalek did to you,” wrote Education Minister Yoav Kisch following the screening, referring to the biblical archenemy of the Jewish people. “Israel needs to destroy every trace of Hamas just like Amalek.”
Likud MK Tsega Melaku reportedly fainted as psychologists were called to the Knesset.
“These despicable murderers do not deserve to be called ‘enemy.’ This thing has no right to exist in the world,” said Religious Zionism Party legislator Michal Waldiger. “The citizens of Gaza also participated in the massacre with unimaginable cruelty, so don’t talk about the uninvolved.”
“I can’t talk about the content, I’m not able to talk about the feelings,” Yesh Atid Party MK Vladimir Beliak said, adding, “Just one sentence: It’s forbidden to forget and forbidden to forgive. Forever.”
Labor Party MK Naama Lazimi said she managed to sit through most of the film.
“When the photograph of the murdered baby appeared, the picture was so painful and difficult that I had to leave. The image will be engraved in the depths of my soul forever,” Lazimi wrote on X.
Following the screening, Likud lawmaker Boaz Bismuth called on the IDF to release the video to the public “so that the whole world will know what happened to us.”
Some 1,400 Israelis, nearly all civilians, were killed in Hamas’s Oct. 7 surprise attack on communities near the Gaza border. Thousands more were wounded, and at least 240 Israelis and foreign nationals were taken captive.
