We had gone to Sderot looking for victims of Hamas. We did not expect what we found.
Sderot is a town two miles from Gaza, regularly rocketed. As we filmed the aftermath of one strike, a man said we should visit his neighbours.
“They lost a brother to Hamas,” he said. “But they are Arabs from Gaza.”
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We knocked on their door. They emerged nervously before ushering us inside.
They are yet another family stricken with grief but this one is different: The Tanaburas may live in Israel but are Gazan Arabs.
On Saturday morning last week, they say their brother, Amir, went out to buy cigarettes.
Younes, 21, said it was the last time they saw him alive.
“Three terrorists chased him, but he was unable to escape. They murdered him like that, for nothing, a good man who saw an injured person and wanted to help,” he said.
They only found out what happened from a TikTok video passed on from a friend, showing him lying dead.
Amir was kind and generous, they say, the third-oldest brother.
“He had a heart of gold,” said 17-year-old Avraham.
“As they say, ‘God takes only the best’. Next month, he should have turned 21.”
Amir’s body was found with multiple gunshot wounds – yet another innocent victim of the Hamas attacks.
They found out Amir was dead when they saw his body in a car on TikTok
The blood-stained mattress his body was on remains in the house
“There was no mercy,” Avraham told us. “They could have shot him once but no – they shot him several times, well after he died. He got a bullet, here, here, here.”
There are very few Gazans living in Israel; their father moved to Sderot three decades ago because he had worked for the Israelis.
All six brothers were born here. They speak only Hebrew but are also practising Muslims.
They still have family in Gaza but are in no doubt what Israel should do next.
“Hamas are murderers, they are terrorists. We should erase everybody, Gaza should be flattened. I have family in Gaza but I think Gaza should be flattened.”
Fearing reprisals or another Hamas attack, they have been blocking the door with a table
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Avraham told us they sneaked out when the attacks were still happening to bring their brother’s body home.
“I’m looking at the blood-stained mattress my brother was lying on and I am thinking to myself ‘was it really real?’,” he said.
Their brother’s body stayed in the house for hours before the ambulance took it away.
Shutters down, they live in state of anxiety – blocking the door with a heavy table in case Hamas comes back or Jewish neighbours turn on them after the attacks.
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They haven’t left their home since the attacks happened. Before we left they warned us to be wary.
“There are shootings, there are still a lot of terrorists on the streets. It’s dangerous. Life here is not safe, be careful.”
We walked the deserted streets of Sderot. A few doors up, a rocket had landed in a house while we had been inside filming but hadn’t gone off. A dog looked out from inside, looking forlorn.
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Earlier we had filmed Israeli troops patrolling after reports of an infiltrator. It is dangerous and eerily empty here.
Those who can have fled. Those left behind are living in fear.
