Lucy Williamson
Middle East correspondent, reporting from reporting from kibbutz Kfar Aza

Image source, Reuters

As the sky began to lighten over Israel's border with Gaza on Wednesday, the people of Kfar Aza moved silently towards the armoury at the centre of the kibbutz.

It was there, shortly after 07:00 on 7 October 2023, that Hamas-led attackers killed half the community's 14-member civil defence squad. They were among 64 killed and 19 kidnapped from the community that day.

The pain of those attacks is still fresh here. But three years on, there are questions about who else should pay the price for Israel's security failure.

"I need my country to take responsibility," said Inbar Goldstein, whose brother and niece were killed, and four other relatives kidnapped from Kfar Aza.

Three years on from Israel's biggest security failure, there is still no independent state inquiry into how it was allowed to happen.

And the man in charge at the time of that failure - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu - is running for election again, with the same campaign promise: to be stronger and tougher than anyone else in protecting Israel from its enemies.

Aside from Hamas's responsibility for the attack itself, there are growing questions in Israel around what caused the country's intelligence failure, what information was passed to military and political leaders in the run-up to the attacks, and what Netanyahu himself knew.

Over the past three years, there have been mounting reports of warnings being given to Netanyahu - by his own security chief, as well as by regional neighbours - which he denies.

Last month, Israel's Haaretz newspaper published extracts from a new book, alleging that the leader of the United Arab Emirates had called Netanyahu 10 days before the attack to warn of Hamas plans for a major operation.

Netanyahu's office has dismissed the report as "an absolute lie" and has said he will sue the newspaper.

Read the full story here

Image source, Reuters

A memorial ceremony and concert has been taking place in Re'im, where the Nova music festival was.

Dozens were taken hostage and 378 people were killed at the festival during the 7 October attacks.

Pictures of the victims of the attack were displayed on screen at the memorial concert.

Israel's President Isaac Herzog was among the speakers at the event.

Families and survivors have been gathering at the site in southern Israel since sunrise.

Sharone Lifschitz, a British-Israeli from east London whose parents were taken hostage, tells the BBC’s Lucy Manning it is "hard to describe" her feelings on the third anniversary of the 7 October attacks.

"You live through it in your body and your soul," she says.

As reported in our earlier post, Lifschitz’s father was killed but her mother was later released.

She says, above all, she is "grateful that all the hostages are back home". Although her father did not survive, she says "at least we know his fate and we know he is not suffering anymore".

Asked how she feels as a British Jew in the aftermath of 7 October, she says she is "rattled".

"As someone who has every reason to hate… I feel so strongly that hate and violence do not take us anywhere," she says.

Asked how she sees the future of the region, she says she wants diplomatic agreements to be reached so that people’s children and grandchildren will "not suffer the fate of this generation".

Lucy Manning
Special correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

Since 7 October British Jews have faced an upsurge in antisemtism with physical and verbal attacks on the streets, at universities, in workplaces and online.

Last year two Jewish men attending Heaton Park synagogue on Yom Kippur were killed after an attack by 35-year-old Jihad Al-Shamie.

Two Jewish men were stabbed in Golders Green in April and last week two men were charged with terror offences alleged to be against Manchester’s Jewish community.

The President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews Phil Rosenberg, whose offices were the target of a pro-Palestinian demonstration leading to five arrests this morning, told the vigil: “This is not just a Jewish problem but a British problem.

"If a proudly British community, who have made and continue to make a massive contribution can be targeted in this way, what hope is there for this country? We need to see a response that is not timid, that is forceful and firm. This is not just a fight for Jews but for Britain itself.”

Days after the Green Party voted to equate Zionism with racism, Keith Black, the Chair of the Jewish Leadership Council, said to applause: “British Jewry is a Zionist community. We stand with Israel. We will stand with you forever more and this day will stay in our hearts.”

The prime minister has said he stood with the Jewish community but many British Jews feel despair and anger that they can’t live peacefully as Jews in the UK.

Lucy Manning
Special correspondent

The British Jewish community are holding a vigil outside Downing Street to remember the 1,200 people who were murdered on 7 October in Israel.

Those attending hold up pictures of British-Israelis who were killed in their homes, at the Nova festival, fighting Hamas or after being taken hostage.

They include: Lianne, Noiya and Yahel Sharabi, Yannai and Liel Hetzroni-Heller, Jake Marlowe, Bernard Cowan, Aner Shapiro, Nathanel Young, Yoni Rapoport, Rotem Kalderon, Danny Darlington, Debbie Abraham, Benji Trakeniski, Yosef Guedalia, and Roi and Nadav Popplewell.

Sharone Lifschitz, a British-Israeli from east London, mourned her father Oded, a peace activist, who was killed after Hamas took him hostage. Her mother Yochoved was also kidnapped and later released.

She told the vigil, which was attended by politicians including Communities Secretary Angela Rayner, about her father’s last moments in captivity.

"He did not break. He looked for my mum in any way he could, and then he was in a room with another hostage. Two frail, injured old people in a hostile place, and they shared real compassion between them. They shared real good words and good deeds, and helped each other to the last moment… May we all, as individuals, our communities, our countries, remember this lesson.”

A woman who was held hostage in Gaza for 54 days says she feels as though the assault was "a day ago".

Moran Stella Yanai tells BBC News the "senses are coming back to my body" after recalling the attack in the lead-up to the three-year 7 October anniversary.

"My legs were shivering today," she adds. "The reactions are similar to that day."

She recalls how "happiness turned into horror" at the Nova music festival. Moran says once she was taken to Gaza she was left in "constant fear, 24-7" that something was going to happen to her and an 18-year-old girl she was held hostage with.

She says she "paused" her life and only started to heal again when the last hostage was returned to Israel.

Now she says she is discovering who she is again at the age of 43. "I think I am learning every single day a little bit more and more," she says.

A memorial is currently taking place in Re'im in southern Israel, where Hamas-led fighters attacked the Nova music festival on 7 October.

You can watch the memorial live at the top of the page.

Shortly we will bring you live footage of a vigil in central London, which is taking place outside Downing Street.

Image source, Reuters

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says in a statement that Israel "will complete the mission" as he commemorates the victims of the 7 October attacks.

"Today, I lit a memorial candle at the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem," he says in a post on X.

"The nation unites on this day in the longing for our dear ones. We will complete the mission: we have settled the score and will continue settling the score with all the murderers."

Lucy Manning
Special correspondent

On 7 October a number of British-Israelis were killed in their homes, at the Nova festival, fighting Hamas or after being taken hostage.

Among those murdered were Lianne, Noiya and Yahel Sharabi, Yannai and Liel Hetzroni-Heller, Jake Marlowe, Bernard Cowan, Aner Shapiro, Nathanel Young, Yoni Rapoport, Rotem Kalderon, Danny Darlington, Debbie Abraham, Benji Trakeniski, Yosef Guedalia, and Roi and Nadav Popplewell.

Lianne Sharabi, 48, was born in Bristol and was killed in her home on Kibbutz Be’eri by Hamas gunmen alongside her daughters, 13-year-old Yahel and 16-year-old Noiya. Her husband, Eli Sharabi, was taken hostage and held for 491 days. He didn’t know they’d been killed until he was released.

Jake Marlowe, 26, from London was working as a security guard at the Nova festival when it was attacked. He helped to get some of those attending the festival to safety before he was shot and killed.

Bernard Cowan, 57, from Scotland was killed in his home on Kibbutz Sufa. He had moved to Israel when he was 19, and was married with three children and two grandchildren.

British-Israeli Aner Shapiro was hailed as a hero after he threw out seven hand grenades that Hamas had thrown into the bomb shelter where he and others were hiding after fleeing the Nova festival. The 22-year-old was killed by the 8th grenade, which exploded in the shelter.

Danny Darlington from Manchester was killed at Kibbutz Nir Oz. A photographer, he was on holiday visiting family when Hamas attacked on 7 October.

British-Israeli Roi Popplewell, 54, was killed in his home on Kibbutz Nirim. His mother and brother Nadav were taken hostage. Nadav, 51, was killed while being held as a hostage by Hamas

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

Similar memorial events have been organised in other countries around the world, including in Germany, where the Jewish students' union installed a vigil at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate.

In France, a memorial stone to the victims was unveiled in the southern city of Carcassonne.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, AFP via Getty Images

Image source, AFP via Getty Images

Image source, Amal Alabadia

Palestinian woman Amal Alabadia gave birth to her second child on the day of the Hamas-led 7 October attacks in 2023.

"It was the most terrifying day in my life... I gave birth to Mohamed under the sound of bombings and the operation room was shaking," she tells BBC News of her experience of the Israeli response to the attack.

Today, she is celebrating Mohamed's third birthday with him and her other son Noah in a refugee camp in Al-Mawasi, and they plan to have a cake.

But "daily life is just a constant suffering", she says. "We just wake up and keep asking ourselves if we will survive this day, what will we eat, if the water truck is coming today."

Though Alabadia says her boys are too young to understand what is happening, she says "when they hear the sound of the rockets, they know this is something they should be afraid of and they run to me and say 'mama we are afraid'.

"It's not a normal childhood for them."

BBC Visual Journalism Team

Gaza has suffered large-scale destruction from Israel’s operations in response to the 7 October attack – including after the ceasefire agreed last October.

Experts from Oregon State University analysed satellite data and estimated about 60% of the buildings in Gaza had been badly damaged or destroyed by the time the US-brokered deal was reached.

But since then, they say, that has risen to 74.5%.

As the map shows, most of that damage has been in the Israeli-controlled area behind the Yellow Line - the boundary which Israel agreed to withdraw troops to as part of the ceasefire deal - with 25,801 buildings showing new damage, including 2,436 that showed no damage before the ceasefire.

Israel has been accused of violating the terms of the ceasefire by destroying buildings, but it says it is dismantling “terror infrastructure” such as tunnels used by Hamas fighters.

Israeli strikes since the ceasefire have also caused damage to an estimated 7,643 buildings (including 695 that previously appeared undamaged) in the area its troops have left.

Mourners are laying wreaths on graves in Kfar Aza, a kibbutz in southern Israel, just a few kilometres from the border with Gaza.

An Israel Defense Forces investigation found that 62 residents of the small village - which had a population of under 1,000 three years ago - were killed in the Hamas-led attacks.

Eighteen security personnel were also killed, and 19 people taken as hostages.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Yolande Knell
Middle East correspondent, reporting from southern Israel

Zikim Beach, Israel’s southernmost coastal spot on the Mediterranean, saw 18 civilians and a soldier killed by Hamas naval commandos on 7 October 2023. But since reopening to the public - with memorials to the dead - a year ago, it has also become a place of healing.

Many traumatised survivors of the Hamas-led assault have embraced surfing therapy organised by the Israeli organisation HaGal Sheli.

"The first time I did it, I just got on my feet and it was like magic. I just wanted to do it again and again and again like a child," Achi Aharon, from Kibbutz Nir Oz, tells me.

"It gives you so much life and sometimes you get into fights in the water but it’s amazing. The ocean is your therapist."

Ophyr Hanan, a spokeswoman for HaGal Sheli (My Wave), says its work has increased "exponentially" since the assault three years ago.

She expects Zikim to offer surfing therapy to some 7,500 people living close to Gaza, with people from Nir Oz typically surfing together.

"It's a coping tool and mechanism that that truly works," Ophyr says. "They’re clapping and cheering for each other when they catch a wave and supporting each other when they fall."

Image source, Bloomberg via Getty Images

Israel and countries around the world are marking three years since Hamas's attacks on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 more taken hostage.

If you're just joining us, here's the latest:

• Memorials in Israel began with a nationwide minute's silence at 06:29 local time (04:29 BST), to mark the time the attacks started - here's a reminder of what happened

• Bereaved relatives and friends have been paying tribute with their loved ones, while others have been calling for an independent inquiry into the 7 October attacks
• Families and survivors have also gathered at the site of the Nova Dance festival in southern Israel, where 378 people were killed by Hamas-led militants, including Ahuva Yavin Mayze's 21-year-old daughter Adi
• In Gaza, much of the population remains displaced since Israel launched an extensive military offensive in response to the attacks, killing at least 74,200 people, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health
• As our Gaza correspondent Rushdi Abualouf writes, families who have been displaced several times during the war are asking where they could go next
• Elsewhere, UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham, along with other world leaders, has paid tribute to the victims of the attacks and told Britain's Jewish community: "We stand with you"

In London, the Metropolitan Police says five people have been arrested for inciting racial hatred outside the Board of Deputies of British Jews building in Camden.

Police say the arrests were made at a "spontaneous protest", with offences "involving allegedly shouting or chanting slogans calling for intifada".

The suspects are in custody and the protest in Camden has ended, the force adds.

Lucy Manning
Special correspondent, reporting from central London

Image source, Getty Images

A pro-Palestinian demonstration is taking place in central London, ignoring a request by the Metropolitan Police for the march, organised by the University of London coalition, to be called off.

The Met said it would cause distress on a day of mourning and reflection and they were also worried about the impact on Jewish students and staff.

Some in the Jewish community have called for it to be banned but the Met said it didn’t have the grounds to ask the Home Secretary to ban it. Instead it asked the organisers to consider moving it to another day.

But about 60 people are demonstrating, according to police, and those involved say they are marching to protest against "three years of genocide" and to "fight for a liberated Palestine".

There are shouts of "Zionists not welcome here" and "Free Palestine from the river to the sea". There have been scuffles with pro-Israeli supporters who gathered to protest against their demonstration. Two pro-Palestinian demonstrators appeared to have been arrested.

The Met has set conditions on the march, including limiting the route and banning protestors from covering their faces to hide their identity.

There are other pro-Palestinian demonstrations planned at other universities. The Union of Jewish Students says the decision to protest on 7 October "is provocative, deliberate and must be condemned".

Image source, Family handout

Across Israel, bereaved relatives and friends are paying tribute to loved ones who were killed in the Hamas-led attacks.

"Today is a difficult day, not only for me but for a large part of the nation," said Shlomo Sharf, a former Israeli footballer, in comments reported by Channel 12. He was paying tribute to his 24-year-old granddaughter May Naim, who was killed at the Nova festival.

The Times of Israel has a tribute from former hostage Yarden Bibas, whose wife and two young sons died in captivity in Gaza. "Shiri, Ariel and Kfir. Sorry. Sorry that you are up there and I am here," the outlet quotes him.

Image source, AFP via Getty Images

Other bereaved and affected families are using the day to call for an independent inquiry into 7 October attacks.

"Even today, bereaved families are being neglected because no one cares," said Yoram Yehudi, whose son Ron also died at the Nova festival. "There is no accountability, and that is a basic requirement from the government," Channel 12 quote him as saying.

Einav Zangauker became an outspoken critic of the Netanyahu government while her son, Matan, was in captivity in Gaza - he was released last October as part of the ceasefire agreement.

“They’re trying to make us forget what happened on 7 October,” she told Army Radio. “We won’t forget, we will demand the truth."

As we reported earlier, families living in Gaza have been displaced several times during the war and are questioning where they could go next.

Atta Saeed Hassan Shweikh is originally from Al Shujjayia in Gaza. His son, daughter, sister and her children have all been killed during the war.

Speaking from Gaza City, he tells the BBC that Palestinians "are living in graves while still alive" and have endured "severe suffering".

"We need a solution so we can return to our homes today, not tomorrow," he adds.

Ahmad Atta Shweikh, from Al-Tuffah, says today's anniversary of the 7 October attacks "means misery, misery and suffering" and is an "especially difficult" day.

"We remember the horrors we witnessed, the destruction and devastation", he says, adding "our lives have been completely destroyed" and all of his family have been killed.

For Samira Abdullah Rizq Al-Wadiya, October 7 was the day she was displaced from her home in the Shuja'iyya area of Gaza City.

"Since the beginning of the war we have been displaced from place to place. We wouldn't even have 40 days of stability before being displaced again," she says.

It has been "suffering", Samira adds, explaining her children were killed in the war.

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

Image source, EPA/Shutterstock

Since sunrise, bereaved families and survivors have been gathering at the site of the Nova Dance festival in southern Israel.

On what was once a dance floor, there’s a memorial for the 378 people killed in the surprise cross-border attack – mostly young Israelis.

Each has photos and a story displayed. This was the site of the biggest single massacre on Israel’s deadliest-ever day.

Some 44 people were kidnapped here of whom only 25 were returned from Gaza alive.

This is the first anniversary of the 7 October attacks with no hostages remaining in Gaza. But last year’s US-brokered ceasefire deal has failed to deliver peace or bring security.

There’s been no end to Gaza’s deadliest ever war as Israel continues to carry out near-daily attacks. A few time this morning we have heard loud thuds - apparently the sound of Israeli demolitions or shelling from across the border.

Most of Gaza is in ruins, with nearly all the population displaced amid dire humanitarian conditions.

Image source, Getty Images