Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel and the 12 months of conflagration that has followed.
Near dawn one year ago, the militant group Hamas began an assault from Gaza into Israel.
It signaled the start of a series of events that have shaken the Middle East. Here are some key moments:
Hamas attacks Israel
On Oct. 7, armed paragliders took off from Gaza. Militants used drones to destroy Israeli surveillance stations and began to fire thousands of rockets. Commandos in trucks and on motorbikes sped into southern Israel.
In an hourslong assault, Hamas and other Gaza-based groups killed up to 1,200 civilians and security personnel across the border in Israel, committed atrocities, and took more than 250 people back to Gaza as hostages.
In response, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel declared war on Hamas. Israel sealed Gaza’s border and started a campaign of airstrikes, a bombardment that would be one of the most intense in 21st-century warfare and kill tens of thousands of Gazans over the months to come.
Iran allies join the fight
Hezbollah, a Lebanese militant group supported by Iran, began firing missiles and drones at Israeli positions on Oct. 8 in support of Hamas. Israel responded with its own airstrikes, with both sides initially calibrating tit-for-tat attacks to avoid escalation. The fighting would force about 150,000 people on both sides of the border to flee their homes.
Others in Iran’s network of armed groups, which it calls the “axis of resistance,” would soon join the fight against Israel and its allies. The Houthis of Yemen disrupted global shipping by attacking commercial vessels in the Red Sea in support of Hamas, and launched a drone strike on Tel Aviv, killing one person.
