Terrifying moment Israeli commander calls for help after armoured vehicle is riddled with machine guns in Hamas ambush
DRAMATIC footage shows the moment Hamas terrorists burst from their tunnels to pummel Israeli fighters with rockets and bullets.
An Israeli commander can be heard calling for help as his armoured vehicle is attacked during the deadly Hamas ambush.
The terrorists fired rocket-propelled grenades at a squad of Israeli armed personnel carriers and tried to attach explosives, as the Israelis called in airstrikes, artillery, and reinforcements.
Sweat glistened on the face of a crewman from Israel’s elite Golani Brigade calling on the radio from inside a 63-tonne carrier while gunshots blared outside.
Some Israelis were injured in the attack but, miraculously, all survived.
An officer in the footage released by the Israel Defence Forces pleaded for backup: “We need you guys to come towards us, and kill everything that is outside the armoured vehicles.”
Lt Col Tomer, the officer under fire who was commanding the Golani Brigade’s 13th battalion told his commanding officer Col Peli that his unit had suffered injuries from missiles.
He explained: “We are doing our best, and we are at war now, we are surviving here and need your help, over.”
The full audio recording continued: “Peli, this is Tomer. We are on the road that is south to …. We had a significant attack on us with missiles and terrorists coming at us. We have injured men, hard to tell how many.
“I need some suppressing fire to help us deflect the terrorists.
“It looks like the situation is calming down a bit, but we still need you guys to come towards us and kill everything that is outside the armoured vehicles.
“We are also getting machine gun fire on our vehicles.”
In a display of bravery, he added: “It’s all good, the main thing is to purge this terrorist nest that is here. We are doing our best, and we are at war now, we are surviving here and need your help, over.”
Peli commended Tomer’s response: “First of all, great, you are relaxed and you are working in an excellent way.”
Tomer responded: “Great, and I repeat, it looks like things are calming down here. Most terrorists are dead, the attacks on us are slowing down.
“We are feeling confident. Please keep moving towards us and give fire to everything that is west and east of our route. On the south of …. In a few minutes it will be over and we can even set on our mission in the morning.”
Speaking to the camera some time later, Col Tomer said: “When we came to a halt, Hamas terrorists jumped out of the tunnels and surrounded us.
“They hit us with RPGs and tried to approach the Namers (armoured personnel carriers) to fix explosives on them.
“Thanks to our quick reactions, we were able to kill some of them and push the others back, using aerial fire, artillery and mortars, and we stormed at them with the armoured vehicles.
“The result is they are dead, and we continue our ground war until victory.”
A lieutenant from the same unit summarised: “We have finished a night of combat and were caught in an ambush, fought with dozens of terrorists and killed them. We have almost no injured soldiers.
“We had a good battle, the spirit and morale is good. And we are getting ready for the next battle… until victory.”
Israel faces a daunting task to wipe out Hamas, owing to the terror group’s 311-mile-long underground tunnel network dubbed the Gaza Metro.
But the Israel Defence Forces are confident they will be victorious despite the difficulty of fighting underground.
Earlier this week, the Israeli military claimed to have killed dozens of Hamas fighters after storming the tunnel network and attacking underground compounds.
The spider’s web under Gaza is made up of 1,300 tunnels which Hamas began digging in 2007.