Kissufim

Kissufim combines an agricultural economy with a long-standing role as a border community in the northwestern Negev.[1] Its Hebrew name means “Longings,” and its early population included settlers from South America, followed by immigrants from North America and Israeli-born youth.[1] The kibbutz is represented in the Eshkol Regional Council and has been affiliated with Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me’uhad.[4]

The community lies in the Gaza Envelope, roughly opposite the midpoint of Gaza’s border with Israel.[2] A 2023 geographic account placed it about two kilometers east of the Gaza Strip, 39 kilometers west of Beersheba, and 25 kilometers southwest of Sderot.[5] Its proximity to the border has shaped both its security responsibilities and its exposure to attacks.[1][2] Before Israel’s 2005 disengagement from Gaza, the nearby crossing connected with Kfar Darom and Gush Katif, Israeli communities then inside Gaza.[6]

The kibbutz, the nearby army post, and the border crossing are distinct sites that share the Kissufim name.[6][7] This distinction is especially important in accounts of October 7: fighting took place both within the civilian community and at the neighboring military installation, and casualty totals sometimes encompass both locations.[7]

Kissufim was founded in 1951 by settlers from South America.[1] Groups from both South and North America participated in its settlement, while an Ayal youth group of about 40 members, most of them Jewish immigrants from Damascus and Aleppo, helped strengthen the young kibbutz in the early 1950s.[8] Members of that group subsequently held important work and management positions; a wave of departures from the group began in the mid-1960s.[8] Later, immigrants from the United States and Canada, together with Israeli-born youth, formed a majority of the membership.[1]

The kibbutz served as an important security outpost opposite Gaza before the Sinai Campaign of 1956 and again before the Six-Day War of 1967.[1] Its establishment also formed part of the development of a line of Israeli communities along the border.[6] The neighboring crossing provided an access route to Israeli communities in Gaza before their evacuation during the 2005 disengagement.[9] One account places the checkpoint’s closure to Jews on the night of August 14, 2005.[10]

A later security episode concerned an underground infiltration route near the community.[11] On October 30, 2017, the IDF destroyed an attack tunnel that had penetrated Israeli territory a few dozen meters from Kissufim; the account attributes its construction to Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.[11] It says eight Palestinian terrorist operatives were killed, including the commander of Islamic Jihad’s central-Gaza brigade and his deputy, and credits an Israeli technological development with discovering the tunnel.[11] The security-affairs analysis characterized the operation, conducted from Israeli territory without entry into Gaza, as a significant setback to the two organizations’ tunnel strategy.[11]

In April 2018, an incendiary kite flown from Gaza caused a small fire in an agricultural field outside Kissufim.[12] Firefighters extinguished the blaze, and no injuries or major damage were reported.[12]

Kissufim’s population was approximately 350 in the mid-1990s and 202 in 2002.[4] A dated population listing recorded 170 inhabitants on December 31, 2004.[4] These figures refer to different years rather than competing estimates for a single date.[4]

Accounts of the period immediately before October 7, 2023, described a community of approximately 250 to 300 residents.[5][2] The population’s development reflected several streams of Jewish migration: South American settlers, North American immigrants, young Syrian Jews from Damascus and Aleppo, and Israeli-born members.[1][8]

Post-attack population figures require a distinction between membership, physical residence, and formal return after displacement.[3][6] In late 2025, the return was still partial, while the July 2026 figure of about 90 percent referred specifically to surviving residents who had completed their official return.[6][3] Recruitment and new housing were intended to expand the community beyond the restoration of its pre-attack population.[13][14]

Kissufim’s agricultural enterprises have included field crops, citrus groves, avocado plantations, dairy cattle, poultry, and organic farming, and the kibbutz also operated a guest house.[1] More recent descriptions identify avocado cultivation, a potato farm, solar-power generation, and employment both inside and outside the community as parts of its economy.[13]

The dairy became a major focus of reconstruction after its destruction during the October 9 fighting.[15] In July 2025, 600 cows that had been housed temporarily at Kibbutz Galgal returned to a new dairy in Kissufim.[15] The replacement facility cost approximately NIS 17 million and included a 40-stall milking installation, with expected annual production of nearly five million liters of milk.[15] The rebuilt and modernized dairy commemorated its murdered manager, Reuven Heinik.[13]

Kissufim is privatized, and residents own their homes.[5][13] Its communal arrangements nevertheless retain shared obligations: a 2025 description identified expectations to volunteer, observe group agreements, and contribute at least NIS 1,000 per household each month toward subsidized education, health, community, and cultural services.[13] Community life was described in terms of solidarity and mutual commitment alongside individual responsibility.[13]

Members respect one another’s freedom to practice religion at home.[13] The swimming pool remains open on the Sabbath, when barbecues and communal activities also take place.[13] After the evacuation, the reopening of the pool, pub, schools, and kindergartens formed part of the restoration of everyday routines as well as the physical rebuilding of the kibbutz.[3][16]

The damage to homes also entered personal reflection on the attack.[17] Months afterward, Erica Brown stood among the remains of a Kissufim house whose surviving walls were marked by bullet holes and searched the rubble for an image of its former inhabitants.[17]

The Kissufim Road archaeological site is a Chalcolithic mortuary site situated between Kibbutz Kissufim and Kibbutz ‘En Hashelosha in the northwestern Negev.[18] It occupies a low hill 97.5 meters above sea level beside an upper stream of Nahal Kissufim.[18] That watercourse drains into Nahal Besor near Kibbutz Re’im.[18] The excavations were presented in the Israel Antiquities Authority’s 2002 report, Kissufim Road: A Chalcolithic Mortuary Site.[18]

Kissufim was among 24 localities attacked by Hamas’s military wing and other Palestinian armed groups on October 7, 2023.[19] Terrorists also established positions at junctions along Route 232, ambushing civilians attempting to escape and firing on security forces.[19] In Kissufim, residents heard air-raid sirens at about 6:30 a.m. and entered protected rooms.[2] Terrorists were inside the kibbutz by approximately 6:55 a.m., entering from the north and south.[7]

The subsequent military investigation estimated that around 150 Hamas Nukhba terrorists reached the Kissufim area and neighboring army post, carrying out killings, abductions, looting, and other crimes.[7] The civil defense squad and armed residents fought alongside arriving troops.[7] Their resistance prevented terrorists from moving freely between the northern and southern neighborhoods and helped stop the entire community from being overrun.[7] Although the squad was small and inadequately trained, its actions had a significant effect on the battle.[7]

Residents who participated in the defense included security coordinator Roni, deputy coordinator Shai Asher, and former security coordinator Sa’ar Margolis.[20] Another resident, Hagai Grosswirth, waited in his kitchen with a pistol while his family sheltered in a protected room; Golani soldiers reached him before the terrorists did.[20] The military inquiry estimated a ratio of approximately 30 terrorists for every armed resident and credited soldiers and the readiness squad with saving lives.[7]

At about 7:30 a.m., terrorists abducted resident Shlomo Mansour and murdered six Thai workers.[7] Throughout the attack, homes and cars were shot at and burned, animals at the dairy were harmed, and electrical lines and a water main were destroyed.[2] Two parents and their youngest child died of asphyxiation inside a protected room after their house caught fire.[2] Other residents remained sheltered while terrorists moved through the community.[2]

Israeli security teams deployed to Kissufim before larger reinforcements arrived, and a tank that had come from Nitzana was positioned near the border fence.[19] An IDF battalion responded during the afternoon and fought for hours while clearing buildings and rescuing residents.[2] Evacuation began at about 5 p.m., even though terrorists remained within the kibbutz.[7]

Fighting also took place at the neighboring army post, where observation soldiers monitored Gaza.[21] Sgt. First Class Yonatan Savitsky of the Egoz commando unit was killed while helping retake the overrun installation.[7][22] A personal account reports a seven-hour gunfight in which his team helped save 50 people, including female observation soldiers, civilians, and Golani soldiers.[22] These events concerned the military post rather than a separate episode inside the kibbutz’s residential neighborhoods.[22]

On October 9, dairy manager Reuven Heinik returned to Kissufim to care for the cows and was murdered by terrorists hiding in the cowshed.[7] Several other workers were wounded during the fighting there, and an IDF tank shell ended the battle at the dairy.[15] Troops also used an Air Force helicopter against the terrorists.[7] A reservist battalion took control of the kibbutz on October 10, but the final terrorist inside Kissufim was not killed until October 12.[7]

Contemporaneous reporting listed Kissufim among the main combat sites on October 9 and 10, together with Nahal Oz and Netiv HaAsara.[23] Announcements that Israeli forces had restored control over villages, posts, and the border fence were accompanied by continued searches for terrorists who might still be hiding.[23] The later inquiry reconstructed an extended clearance operation rather than a battle confined to October 7 itself.[7]

The IDF investigation took about a year and drew on interviews, radio recordings, security-camera footage, and on-site reconstructions.[7] Its estimates placed approximately 25 terrorists killed at the military camp, 30 inside the kibbutz, and 50 in the surrounding area, with the remainder retreating toward Gaza.[7] Its authors cautioned that inaccuracies could remain in the reconstruction.[7]

The inquiry concluded that the military failed in its mission to protect Kissufim’s residents.[7] It identified an incorrect threat scenario, lack of an intelligence warning, insufficient preparation for a multi-front attack, and inadequate training for combat inside an overrun civilian community.[7] Other findings concerned ineffective command and control, poor task allocation, inadequate protection of both the camp and kibbutz, and inefficient use of available forces.[7] Troops lacked uniform procedures for clearing the community, contributing to delays.[7]

The investigation recorded 17 civilian deaths in the Kissufim area, including six foreign workers and a member of the local readiness squad, and 28 soldiers killed in the fighting.[7] It also found that resident Tom Gudo was mistakenly killed by Israeli forces during the clearance operation.[7] Shlomo Mansour, who was abducted from the kibbutz, was subsequently murdered.[3][7]

Other accounts used different geographic scopes and periods: an early November 2023 report listed 16 kibbutz members murdered, one abducted, and nine soldiers killed, while a July 2026 community tally counted 20 people killed on October 7 and the following days, including 14 community members and six foreign workers.[20][3] These totals describe different reporting frames and should not be added together or treated as interchangeable counts.[7]

Kissufim was evacuated after the attack, and residents initially stayed in a hotel near the Dead Sea.[6] An October 2023 proposal envisaged a temporary community arrangement at Nahshonim, including 110 prefabricated homes and access to services there and in neighboring kibbutzim.[5] Some residents instead moved to temporary housing in Omer in September 2024.[6] A returning family later described its displacement as a stay in Dead Sea hotels followed by another year in Omer.[16]

Repair work accelerated from August 2024.[6] A 2025 assessment reported damage to 97 percent of 140 residential and public buildings, with 28 demolished and another nine undergoing demolition at the time.[13] A separate July 2025 report said that 20 residential and public buildings had been damaged and that the Tkuma Directorate was undertaking rehabilitation work with an investment of NIS 84 million; completion was then expected in December 2025.[15]

By December 2025, about 25 families had returned, and schools had reopened in September of that year.[6] Chairman Lior Carmel hoped residents would return by summer 2026, while acknowledging that returning was traumatic for some and continued displacement was difficult for others.[6] By July 2026, approximately 90 percent of residents who had survived the attack had completed their formal return.[3] Children again rode bicycles along familiar paths, the swimming pool and pub reopened, and damaged kindergarten buildings were rededicated.[3][16]

Expansion accompanied rehabilitation.[13] Plans announced in 2025 called for 25 new housing units over two to three years, with funding from the Tekuma Directorate and the kibbutz.[13] A more detailed October 2025 plan placed the homes in two neighborhoods intended for young adults, soldiers, members’ children, and new families, with support also expected from the Jewish Agency and private donors.[14] Its stated goal was to double the number of members over the following decade.[14]

The kibbutz also sought to add about ten members annually, particularly younger people and families; dozens of prospective families had applied by the time of the 2025 account.[13] In June 2026, Kissufim was included among 14 Western Negev communities participating in a broader housing initiative intended to create approximately 1,000 homes across the participating communities.[24]

Israel opened the Kissufim crossing to humanitarian-aid trucks on November 12, 2024, adding a route for supplies into central and southern Gaza.[25] It was the crossing’s first opening for such traffic since 2005.[26] Shipments included food, water, medical supplies, and shelter equipment, with security inspections conducted at Kerem Shalom before the trucks entered Gaza.[25]

Preparatory engineering work included inspection facilities, protective infrastructure, and roads on both sides of the border.[9] The operation involved coordination among the Southern Command, the Defense Ministry’s Crossing Authority, the IDF, and COGAT.[25] The route was prepared to carry supplies toward Khan Younis, the central camps, and Mawasi.[9] The Kissufim area had also served as a staging area for IDF units during the battle for Khan Younis between December 2023 and April 2024.[9]

Some kibbutz residents objected to reopening the crossing, describing its association with the October 7 attack as a source of trauma.[26] Those objections concerned residents’ experiences and understanding of the crossing’s role, rather than a separate determination of the attack’s precise routes.[26]