Palestinian freedom group Hamas's attack dubbed "Operation Al-Aqsa Storm" against Israel has so far resulted in the deaths of at least 200 Israelis and the abduction of dozens of security forces, whereas Tel Aviv's counteroffensive involving air and ground strikes martyred nearly 232 Palestinians and injured thousands in Gaza Strip.
Citing Israel's health ministry, N12 News said the ongoing Hamas attack claimed the lives of at least 250 Israelis and left more than 1,100 wounded.
The Palestinian health ministry said up until 4:20pm there were "232 martyrs and 1,610 wounded with different injuries" in the conflict.
Palestinians across the world and the country are celebrating the highly coordinated assault, which totally blindsided Tel Aviv, proving to be historically successful for the resistance.
The liberation group started the surprise attack around 6:30am with thousands of rockets aimed at towns and cities as far as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, some bypassing the Iron Dome defence system and hitting buildings.
Hamas fighters — travelling in vehicles, boats and even using motorised paragliders — breached blockaded Gaza's security barrier and attacked nearby Israeli towns and military posts, sparking gun battles as panicked residents hid out in bunkers.
Bodies were seen lying on the streets of the town of Sderot near Gaza.
"Send help, please!" one Israeli woman sheltering with her two-year-old child pleaded as militants outside opened fire at her house and tried to break into their safe room, Israeli media reported.
AFP journalists witnessed armed Palestinians gathered around an Israeli tank that was partially in flames, and others returning to Gaza City driving a seized Israeli Humvee.
An Al Jazeera correspondent said the unprecedented attack had left Israelis in “tremendous shock”.
“I spoke by text with an acquaintance in Tel Aviv. She says she was hurrying to get into a bomb shelter. The fact that several villages including some towns were attacked and captured – this is something that has never happened before,” Reynolds said.
“This took a lot of planning, strategising from Hamas,” he noted.
In an exclusive interview with Al Arabiya English, the Israeli foreign ministry conveyed that Hamas, the Palestinian group responsible for launching the most significant attack on Israel in years on Saturday, will face consequences for their actions deemed as "terrorist."
The foreign ministry characterized Hamas as a group engaged in acts of violence and stated that they would "face consequences" for their actions.
“This morning Israel was attacked by the terrorist organisation Hamas. This was a combined attack, with up to a thousand rockets [fired] from the Gaza Strip [toward] Israeli cities, from Jerusalam, to Tel Aviv,” Lior Hayat, spokesperson of the Israeli foreign ministry, told Al Arabiya English.
“In parallel, there was a drone attack by the terrorists [on] cities and towns across the country; they murdered Israeli citizens and soldiers. They have taken hostages – both civilians and soldiers. That is the situation right now.”
Al Arabiya English quoted Hayat as saying the Israeli foreign ministry had a message to Hamas.
“Israel will defend itself,” he said. “We call on the international community to condemn - as strong as possible - the terror attacks from Hamas.”
“We will do whatever it takes in order to get to each and every terrorist who participated in these attacks – they will pay a price. Everyone who took part… including Iran.”
“This was an unprovoked attack. An unprovoked attack leads to a war. The entire responsibility lies in the hands of the leaders of Hamas for everything that will happen in the Gaza Strip starting from today.”
He said Israel on Saturday was a “nation in shock by the murders, the attacks and the fact [that] civilians [were] targeted.”
“The Israeli government is now discussing ways of retaliation, and we will know more in the next few hours.”
Earlier, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "We are at war" and vowed severe retaliation after ordering an extensive mobilisation of Israeli army reserves. "The enemy will pay an unprecedented price," he warned.
Violence between Israel and the Palestinians has been surging since early last year, with fatalities in the occupied West Bank hitting a scale not seen in years.
"We decided to put an end to all the crimes of the occupation (Israel). Their time for rampaging without being held accountable is over," said the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas which controls the Gaza Strip.
"We announce Operation Al-Aqsa Storm and we fired, in the first strike of 20 minutes, more than 5,000 rockets," a senior leader of Hamas said.
The Israeli defence minister claimed that Hamas had made a "grave mistake" by declaring war on Israel soon after Israel's military declared that it was on a war footing.
According to AFP, Israeli forces said that they were fighting Palestinians on the ground in several locations around the Gaza Strip on Saturday as part of their operation "Swords of Iron" after barrages of rockets were fired from the enclave into Israeli territory.
"It was a combined ground raid which happened through paragliders, through the sea and through the ground," army spokesman Richard Hecht told reporters. "Right now we're fighting. We're fighting in certain locations around the Gaza Strip... our forces are now fighting on the ground."
Following the ongoing clashes, Italy said Saturday it backed Israel against the attack that was underway after hundreds of rockets were fired on its territory from Gaza.
The Italian government said it "condemns in the strongest terms the terror and the violence underway against innocent civilians", adding: "We back the right of Israel to defend itself".
The head of a regional council for Israeli border areas northeast of the Gaza Strip was killed Saturday in a firefight with the Palestinians, the council said.
"The president of the regional council, Ofir Liebstein, was killed during an exchange of fire with terrorists," the Shaar Negev regional council said in a statement.
Such powerful action from Gaza, an impoverished enclave home to 2.3 million people, has been rare since Hamas took control in 2007, leading to Israel's crippling blockade. Gaza is sealed off from Israel by a militarised border barrier.
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