The last 24 hours before the activation of the land clearing operation of its centers Hamas in the Gaza area is the Israeli army, which is lined up on five fronts along the border, with infantry, artillery, tanks and commandos.

See live image from Gaza:

Israeli air force and artillery pound Hamas positions in Gaza every 30 seconds, preparing the ground for ground operations. Images from Gaza show flattened areas, while electricity and water supplies have already been cut.

Earlier on Thursday, the head of the IDF, after admitting mistakes in repelling the Hamas attack, he hinted at the impending attack on Gaza, saying:

“It will take time and it will require composure, but it is good that our cohesion and brotherhood have been strengthened. We will deal an eternal blow to our enemies, that is our mission and we are determined to achieve it.”

“Hamas is the Islamic State and we will crush and destroy it as the world destroyed the Islamic State,” assured the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

According to Hamas authorities, more than 1,400 Palestinians have been killed in the past six days in the Gaza Strip by Israeli strikes that have reduced entire apartment blocks to rubble.

Israeli Air Force Apache helicopters, equipped with missiles, fly low and periodically enter the enclave, a narrow strip of land home to 2.4 million people.

Volunteers keep arriving: ‘We’ll wipe them off the map’

Tom, a 24-year-old reservist, arrived from Zion, near Tel Aviv, to join his unit. His younger brother, Adam, was already serving. “I can’t tell you what I will do. Only one thing (…) we will wipe them off the map. “No one has killed Jews like this since the Holocaust,” says Tom, still dressed in civilian clothes: shorts, a T-shirt and sandals. “Soon, in front of us there will be no one to fight us, to attack us, to spoil our lives,” he added, anger evident in his voice.

Volunteers who arrived from all over the country hand out food and refreshments to the soldiers under the hot sun. All of them wear bulletproof vests and helmets.

“I will come back tomorrow and every day to bring them nice things,” promises Yuval, 49, the manager of a transport company in Herzliya.

Avraham, a 60-year-old father who arrived from Netanya, north of Tel Aviv, hugs his three spare sons. “I am proud of them. They are like me, like all of us, they are not afraid of anything,” he says with a smile.

The army has placed barriers everywhere to limit the risk of infiltration by armed Palestinians. A few kilometers away is the Nahal Oz kibbutz, where women and children were massacred, but journalists are not allowed access.

The soldiers, young men of 19-20 years old, feel nervous and sometimes abruptly force the few journalists to turn back. “You have nothing to see here. We have war. Come back when everyone is dead in Gaza,” says one of them.

, APE