New documents released by MSNBC show Hamas killers were targeting elementary schools and a youth center when they stormed the border last week.
Update: This is an interesting development, considering it was the Sabbath when they crossed into Israel for the attack and the children would not be in school. Was the original plan for a different day?
Over 1,300 Jews were slaughtered in the Hamas attack. At least another 120 Jews were taken hostage and moved to Gaza.
Now there is evidence that Hamas targeted schools, a youth center, and an outdoor youth concert.
NBC News contributor Anna Schecter: Responder organizations like ZAKA, went in and took information on the deaths, took notes on what they were seeing. The murdered children, women, families killed together. And they also found the bodies of Hamas terrorists who were killed during the violence. And on the bodies of those Hamas terrorists in pockets were these documents. And so the first responders recovered them and photographed them. And currently, the IDF is reviewing a trove of documents, and a source within the Israeli government passed the documents that we reported on to me, and we analyzed them and put out the news last night.
MSNBC reporter: What are some of the most disturbing allegations? Obviously a warning to our viewers that the details are difficult. But what sticks out to you?
Anna Schecter: Well, the directive to take hostages and kill as many people as possible. Those were two bullet points on one of the pages that an NBC News translator translated into English from Arabic. But also there was the old Da’at School, the new Da’at School, and a youth center that were on bullet points. “Search the school number one, search school. Number two, search the youth center.” Then sources also told me that dining halls, dental offices were marked on these maps and were targets. Another directive was to surround and gather hostages within a dining hall. It was so detailed that one Hamas unit was to take the hostages and hand them off to a second Hamas unit. There were even details about how many motorbikes would approach in one unit, how many jeeps, four motorbikes, then two jeeps, four motorbikes, then two jeeps. So the detail is really unprecedented. And what my sources have told me is that this is unprecedented. To find this detailed account and this intelligence on the bodies of the attackers.
The attack was highly organized. Hamas was targeting the children and young adults at a dance party.
Truly wicked.