Lucy Manning
Special correspondent

The former British-Israeli hostage Emily Damari has called on people to stand up to antisemitism and terrorism.

She was held as a hostage in Gaza for 471 days after being taken by Hamas gunmen from her home on 7 October. She was shot in her hand and leg.

In a video message, she thanked those who had campaigned for her release and asked people to remember what had happened on 7 October.

"Fifteen British citizens were killed that day, and another British hostage later died in captivity…It was not an accident; it was a planned terrorist attack.. And yet, even today, there are people who deny what happened, distort it, or simply choose to look away."

Damari said Jewish communities around the world had carried the pain of the last three years.

"In Britain, the Jewish community has faced rising anti-Semitism and have often felt afraid simply because they are Jewish…Please continue to stand against antisemitism and terrorism."

Image source, EMILY DAMARI

Hamas has released a statement praising 7 October as a "historic milestone" in its "ongoing struggle project".

The statement, attributed to the group and disseminated in Palestinian media, calls the attack "a natural response" to "bitter suffering" imposed by Israel.

It says that the idea that the conflict with Israel began on 7 October 2023 is "a blatant falsification of reality and motives", and that it is not over yet.

Hamas accuses Israel of committing genocide - an accusation it denies, see more in our earlier post.

It says that almost 1,500 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks since the ceasefire was agreed last October.

In a separate Telegram post by the Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas' military wing, shared a stylised image of a paraglider flying through a demolished section of fence - referencing the paragliders who breached the Israeli border during the attacks three years ago.

Image source, AFP via Getty Images

Alongside UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham, other world leaders have shared tributes for the third anniversary of 7 October. Here are some of them:

• The Hamas-led attack marked a "profound rupture", says German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. "We commemorate the victims, we share their pain", he says, adding that antisemitism must be confronted with "even greater resolve"
• "We share the grief" of Israel and the bereaved and "do not forget the names and faces" of those who were killed, says French President Emmanuel Macron, affirming France's commitment to "combating antisemitism and terrorism"
• "The unspeakable savagery and terror of 7 October must never happen again," says Ursula von der Leyen, President of the EU Commission, adding that the EU "remains ready to help turn today’s fragile ceasefire into a durable peace, based on a two-state solution"
• Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson says it is "downright appalling" that Jews have "been forced to live with growing antisemitism" since 7 October. "We stand behind Sweden's Jews, and there we will remain," he says

A minute of silence is about to be observed across Israel at 12:00 local time (10:00 BST) to mark three years since the deadly 7 October attacks.

Earlier, a separate minute of silence was observed nationwide at 06:29 local time (04:29 BST) - the time when the Hamas-led attacks began.

Another minute's silence is expected later this evening.

Image source, EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

The deadliest incident in the Hamas-led 7 October attacks was at the Nova music festival.

Air raid alarms sounded at the trance music rave, which was taking place in the Negev desert not far from the Gaza Strip, at around 06:30 local time.

Not long after, Hamas-led militants stormed the area. They gunned down people attempting to flee by car or on foot, as well as people hiding in shelters along the highway.

Many that survived described hiding for hours or playing dead. Police reinforcements did not arrive at the site until 12:30 local time and the army didn't come for another two hours after that.

An Israel Defense Forces (IDF) probe found that 378 people were killed at the festival and 44 taken hostage.

Yolande Knell
Middle East correspondent, at the Nova Festival site near Re'im, southern Israel

"What happened here was not human," says Ahuva Yavin Mayze as she sweeps the stones around the memorial for her 21-year-old daughter, Adi.

We are standing on what was the dancefloor at the Nova Festival site three years ago. She tells me that bereaved families, survivors and former hostages taken from here - Israel’s single deadliest site on its deadliest ever day - are still suffering deep trauma.

"I’m a mother, I just know that my daughter, she was shot in the head and died instantly," Ahuva says. "But many parents who know what happened to their beloved ones, they cannot recover.

"The stories from here are dystopic, unimaginable."

During the 7 October attacks, heavily armed Hamas gunmen came across this dance party after breaking across the Gaza border.

Witnesses have described how festival-goers were shot, killed, raped and tortured. Many bodies were found mutilated.

A total of 378 people were killed here, mostly young Israelis. Forty-four were kidnapped, of whom 25 were brought back from Gaza alive.

Image source, Bloomberg via Getty Images

UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham has paid tribute to "those who were senselessly killed by Hamas terrorists" on 7 October.

"The impact of the attacks has been felt not just in Israel, but in Jewish communities across the world who still bear the burden of the tragic events that day," he says in a social media post.

He says that a "disturbing rise in antisemitic behaviour in the UK" has been observed in the years since the attacks.

"I want Britain’s Jewish community to hear this from me directly. We stand with you. Abuse and violence against you, in any form, will not be tolerated," he says.

"An attack on Jewish people in Britain is an attack on all of us. Antisemitism has no place in this country, and we will do everything we can to stamp it out."

Rushdi Abualouf
Gaza correspondent

For ordinary Palestinians, the question of whether they can remain in Gaza is no longer an abstract political question.

Families who have already been displaced several times during the war increasingly ask where they could go next, and whether another displacement might eventually take them outside Gaza altogether.

Mohammed Emad al-Din, 38, a father of two who works as a barber in Gaza City, says he has been displaced five times since 7 October.

His home was destroyed and his barber shop was partially damaged. He tells the BBC the fear of being forced out of Gaza now follows him even into his dreams.

“I don’t believe Israel caused all this destruction for nothing,” he says. “They have turned Gaza into a place that is almost impossible to live in, and I fear that we will eventually end up outside the place where we were born.”

His fear is echoed in conversations across Gaza, where repeated displacement and the destruction of homes and livelihoods have left many people uncertain not only about where they will live next month, but whether they will ultimately be able to remain in the territory at all.

An art installation commemorating the victims of the 7 October attacks can be seen on a beach in Tel Aviv, Israel.

It features 1,200 human figures, referring to those killed on the day, near large Hebrew letters that spell "Total Failure".

It is unclear who organised the installation. As we reported earlier, there have been several anti-government protests taking place across the capital to mark today's anniversary.

Image source, EPA/Shutterstock

Image source, EPA/Shutterstock

Image source, EPA/Shutterstock

Lucy Williamson
Middle East correspondent, reporting from kibbutz Kfar Aza

Image source, Reuters

Crowds filed into the small cemetery at Kfar Aza, shoulders slung with rifles, or television cameras, or loaded with the weight of residents’ memories here.

In plastic chairs, under an awning shielding mourners from the sun, Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant sat with kibbutz residents and listened as the names of all those killed here were read aloud, one by one.

Many senior defence and security officials have resigned or been fired since the attacks took place. But three years after Israel’s worst security failure, there has not been any independent state inquiry into what went wrong.

Image source, EPA/Shutterstock

Anti-government protesters have dyed the fountain in Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Square red to mark the anniversary of 7 October attacks.

The fountain has been used as a memorial site for victims of the attacks, with pictures, flowers and messages laid around the basin wall.

Protesters also blocked one of the main highways in Tel Aviv to hold a moment of silence for those killed on 7 October earlier this morning.

They held banners that read "the people will remember their sons and daughters" along with others that say "a complete failure" and "guilty" next to an image of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Anti-government groups in Israel, such as the October Council and the Kumu Movement, have been demanding a public inquiry into the 7 October attacks.

Image source, EPA

Image source, NurPhoto via Getty Images

It's approaching a year since a ceasefire was declared in Gaza.

Hamas and Israel agreed to halt the war after accepting US President Donald Trump's 20-point peace plan. It included a suspension of "all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment".

Since it was declared, Israeli strikes have continued, and the UN has warned of dire living conditions.

More than 1,460 people have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since the ceasefire was declared, according to latest figures from the territory's Hamas-run Ministry of Health.

The Israeli military has said it operates in "a precise manner to remove threats and protect its troops and Israeli civilians, in accordance with the agreement".

Last month, the Israeli military said that five troops had been killed in combat since the ceasefire began, and one contractor had died in an "operational accident".

Image source, Getty Images

Shortly after sunrise on 7 October 2023, the Hamas-led attack on Israel began.

It started with a barrage of thousands of rockets fired into the country.

As rockets flew, an estimated 6,000 Hamas-led militants breached the border into Israel in dozens of places, entering in cars, on motorbikes or in some cases by paraglider.

They attacked military bases and stormed through multiple kibbutzim - small villages - near the border, burning homes and killing civilians. In one kibbutz, Nir Oz, 41 people were killed and 76 kidnapped out of its 400-strong community

The attackers also targeted a music festival in the Negev desert. They gunned down partygoers at Nova festival, killing 378 people and kidnapping 44 more, according to an IDF tally.

In total, around 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken as hostages, making it the single deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust.

Israel responded to the 7 October attacks by launching a military offensive in Gaza, triggering a war that has killed more than 74,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.

Image source, EPA

Hundreds of people gathered at dawn in Sydney, Australia, to mark the third anniversary of the October 7 attacks.

The event at Bondi on Wednesday morning included a minute’s silence at 06:29am local time (20:29 BST Tuesday), to mark the exact time of the Hamas-led assault in Israel.

Several members of the public draped themselves in Israeli flags as they gathered at Bondi Pavilion to commemorate the lives lost three years ago.

Israel’s ambassador to Australia Hillel Newman told the crowd that behind every person killed on October 7 was "a face and a family”, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

He also said "there is a direct line between the shooting at Nova [the music festival targeted by Hamas] and the shooting at Bondi".

On 14 December 2025, 15 people were killed during an antisemitic attack on a Hanukah celebration at Bondi, Sydney.

Image source, Reuters

Israelis are comforting each other at memorial events across Israel, as they remember those killed in the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October.

Three years ago, about 1,200 people were killed, and 251 taken hostage, in the deadliest attack on Jewish people since the Holocaust.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Rushdi Abualouf
Gaza correspondent

Image source, Reuters

Three years after the Hamas attacks of 7 October 2023, the overriding fear among many Palestinians I have spoken to is no longer simply about how the war will end.

It is about whether Gaza’s Palestinians will ultimately be able to remain on their land.

Over recent weeks, I have spoken to officials from Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, as well as figures from across the Palestinian political spectrum.

Despite their deep divisions, there is an unusual degree of agreement on one issue: they believe the threat of large-scale displacement from Gaza remains real.

They also agree that Palestinians currently lack either the military or political means to prevent such a scenario if it were to unfold.

That fear has become one of the defining features of Gaza three years after 7 October.

The territory Palestinians inhabit today bears little resemblance to the Gaza that existed before the war. Large parts have been devastated.

Much of the population remains displaced, many living in tents and makeshift shelters, while access to food, clean water and medical treatment remains severely restricted.

Image source, Getty Images

In the wake of the 7 October attack, Israel launched an extensive military offensive in Gaza, displacing more than a million people and killing tens of thousands.

According to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health, at least 74,200 people have been in killed in Gaza by Israel since the action began.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says humanitarian needs in Gaza remain "overwhelming", with many struggling to access water, food and medicine.

An estimated 80% of all structures in Gaza have been destroyed or damaged during the war between Israel and Hamas, according to the UN.

More than 1.9 million people - about 90% of the territory's population - have been displaced, many of them multiple times, and 1.2 million of them are currently living in tents or makeshift shelters, it says.

Last year, the world's leading association of genocide scholars declared that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza. Israel has regularly denied its actions in Gaza amount to genocide and says they are justified as a means of self-defence.

A ceasefire came into effect last October, though Israeli airstrikes and attacks on populated areas have continued.

Lucy Williamson
Middle East correspondent, reporting from kibbutz Kfar Aza

The widow of the deputy commander of Kfar Aza's civil defence unit, who was killed by Hamas gunmen three years ago, describes the moment he stopped answering his phone.

“My stomach flips and I start to worry,” she says as her voice begins to break with tears.

“At 7:21, I get a message saying he loves me,” she continues. “It’s the best present I ever got.”

“After that, I only know things from stories.”

Lucy Williamson
Middle East correspondent, reporting from kibbutz Kfar Aza

As the sky began to lighten over Kfar Aza, a kibbutz in southern Israel attacked by Hamas, people trickled in twos and threes towards the armoury building.

The cawing of crows cuts through the regular thud of artillery from Gaza, just a few kilometres away, and the buzz of a military drone overhead.

In the gloom, a small crowd of residents gathered at the armoury where seven members of the kibbutz’s civil defence unit were attacked and killed by Hamas gunmen that morning.

At 06:29 (04:29 BST), the flag was lowered to half-mast to the sound of a lone bugle, and their names read aloud.

A young woman stood apart from the crowd, crying quietly.

Image source, Lucy Williamson/BBC

People are visiting memorials at the site of the Nova music festival where more than 378 people were killed and 44 taken hostage in the Hamas-led attacks on October 7 2023.

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters