Route 232 Gunfire echoes as troops gather at the new frontline

Route 232, an Israeli highway, runs parallel to the blockaded Gaza Strip. Surrounded by fl at agricultural land in every direction , from it the higher floors of the overcrowded enclave’s high-rises are visible about 3 miles away.

- Bethan McKernan

Now, the road appears to have become the new defacto boundary between Israel and Hamas, the Islamist movement that launched a devastating surprise sea, land and air offensive on 20 neighbouring kibbutzim and Israeli towns last weekend . They slaughtered more than 1,000 people and abducted dozens more to be used as bargaining chips. More than 830 people in Gaza have been killed in retaliatory Israeli airstrikes.

It is not just a new border: it is a new front line. Early yesterday, four days into the fifth round of war since Hamas seized control of Gaza in 2007, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said Israel’s perimeter with the strip had finally been secured.

By midmorning, that was no longer the case: the boom and crump of airstrikes and artillery, along with the rattle of automatic gunfire, echoed across the empty fields. A convoy of Israeli tanks roared past . Two military helicopters hovered overhead and jumpy soldiers at checkpoints bristled at every distant movement. Black smoke rose above Gaza.

Kibbutz Re’im, off Route 232, is where 260 partygoers at an all-night rave were massacred at daybreak on Saturday . Survivors have told of playing dead next to bodies of their friends and watching women being raped before they were shot in the head, or tied up and burned. On the kibbutz’s outskirts, the bodies of Israelis have now all been removed.