'Bombs killed 50 hostages'

Tank mission paves way for ground attack | Israeli planes hit 250 targets in Gaza onslaught

- ANDY LINES

AROUND 50 Gaza hostages have been killed by Israeli bombs, their Hamas captors allege.

The claim by its military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades, came as Israeli tanks rolled in and out of the region, targeting military infrastructure.

A full invasion remains imminent with thousands of troops on the border.

Israel says 224 of its citizens are still captive in Gaza, taken there during the horrific October 7 Hamas raids in which more than 1,400 were killed.

Early yesterday tanks led by the Givati infantry brigade and the 162nd Armoured Division rolled into Gaza in what was described as a “relatively large” ground incursion.

The Israel Defence Forces said the operation was “preparation for the next stages of combat” and that “the soldiers have since returned to Israeli territory”.

Last night the IDF claimed it had killed the deputy head of Hamas’s intelligence directorate, Shadi Barud, in a strike in Gaza yesterday afternoon.

It accused Barud of masterminding the October 7 attacks with his boss Yahya Sinwar.

Yesterday some soldiers were able to temporarily leave the front line to visit some of those they saved.

APPLAUSE 

At a resort hotel on the Dead Sea we saw them given spontaneous applause as they came into the reception area.

More than 120 were killed in the Be’eri kibbutz but one survivor said the soldiers had “saved dozens more” when they took on the gunmen. Some 1,500 Hamas fighters were killed inside Israel, the IDS said.