A baby's crushed crib lying outside a burnt-out home. Corpses strewn on streets. Body bags lined up on an outdoor basketball court. The stench of death everywhere.
Just a few days ago this was the sleepy, scenic kibbutz of Kfar Aza, an Israeli farming community of about 750 people, many of them families with young children.
Now it's become a charnel house after Hamas gunmen burst out of Gaza on Saturday and laid waste to the village.
"Mothers, fathers, babies, young families killed in their beds, in the protection room, in the dining room, in their garden," Israeli Major General Itai Veruv said on Tuesday.
The seasoned soldier visibly shaken as troops went door-to-door to collect the bodies of residents killed in their homes.
"It's not a war, it's not a battlefield. It's a massacre," he said. Some victims were decapitated, he added.
"I've never seen anything like this, and I've served for 40 years."
Kfar Aza, just 3km from Gaza, was among the communities hit hardest by the Hamas assault on southern Israel.
Israeli officials say the attack has killed at least 1,000 people, mostly civilians gunned down in their homes, on the streets or at a dance festival.
Retaliatory Israeli strikes have killed at least 850 Gazans and flattened whole districts, Palestinian officials said.
Kfar Aza attack survivor Avidor Schwartzman said he hid with his wife and one-year-old daughter in the safe room of their house for more than 20 hours before being rescued by Israeli soldiers and emerging to confront a scene of "pure hell".
"There were bodies everywhere. Dead bodies everywhere," the 38-year-old said. "We saw our little piece of paradise, our little piece of heaven, was totally burnt – burnt and with blood everywhere."
Today, Israeli Defence Forces took foreign press through the kibbutz, where ruins of burnt-out houses oversaw streets scattered with dead residents and militants, torched cars and piles of broken furniture and other wreckage.
There was no official death toll from the Kfar Aza kibbutz as of this evening, with Israeli soldiers still searching homes they suspect may be booby-trapped with explosives.
The military spokesperson at the site said at least dozens of residents had been killed in the attack.
She added that it had not yet pieced together the precise chain of events, with fighting having only completely ended late on Monday.
The Hamas gunmen rammed through the kibbutz's fence, possibly using an earthmover, clearing the way for dozens of other gunmen to enter through the breach, she said.
Militants also arrived on motorcycles and a hang-glider, the spokesperson added. Veruv, the major general, put the total number of gunmen to enter the kibbutz at about 70.
Waves of the attackers, armed with Kalashnikov rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and hand grenades, stormed the village, a reserve soldier told Reuters, declining to be named as he was not authorised to speak to the media.
Some of the Hamas militants' bodies could still be seen lying on streets around the kibbutz, wearing black shirts, khaki trousers and army vests. One still had his hand on a pistol.
'Our worst nightmares'
Mr Schwartzman told Reuters he was woken at about 6.30 am on Saturday by the booming sounds of rockets and that he and his family moved to their safe room an hour later after receiving a kibbutz-wide text telling them it was dangerous to be outside.
"We heard shootings and we were basically barricaded in for 21 hours until the army rescued us," his wife, Keren Flash, took up the account.
"We kept hearing shootings and gunfire and bombs and alarms, and we just didn't know what was happening. Our worst nightmares."
Soldiers were still securing the streets of the kibbutz, once neatly lined with palm trees, banana plants and single-storey houses with verandas.
Bursts of gunfire and explosions could be heard in the distance. Jets could be heard above and smoke could be seen rising from Gaza. Sirens warned of incoming rockets intercepted overhead.
One soldier shouted: "Tell the world what you saw here."
Video footage shows attack on kibbutz
Elsewhere, dashcam and CCTV footage has emerged of attacks on other communities inside Israel early on Saturday morning.
Dashcam footage taken in a vehicle driving along a road west of Reim kibbutz showed Hamas fighters on the road shooting at the vehicle.
Reuters was able to confirm the location by road layout, bus stop's location and multiple adjoining roads, which matched satellite imagery of the area.
Another dashcam video taken north of Reim kibbutz showed Hamas fighters kicking a man near a road, and later firing shots off camera.
Reuters was able to confirm the location by coordinates visible in the dashcam footage, bus stop’s location, placement of trees and placement of street light, which matched satellite and file imagery of the area.
Another CCTV video showed Hamas fighters entering Beeri kibbutz before 6am and shooting at a car near the gate, killing the occupants inside.
Reuters was able to confirm the location by layout of trees, yellow entrance gate and an adjoining road that matched satellite and file imagery of the area.
