A MAN originally from Worcestershire has spoken out about the terrifying experience of being inches away from Hamas who were destroying his home.

Ben, who did not wish to give his second name, had lived in a kibbutz named Be'eri, located around 5km from the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip, for the past 26 years after meeting his wife.

The 52-year-old spoke of how the pair were stuck for 12 hours in a small safe room in his home while Hamas militants smashed and set fire to their house. 

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The two were stuck for hours with no water and no food.

Speaking to Sky News from an evacuation point near the Dead Sea, he said: "We were so underprepared for such an unprecedented attack, and we didn't have water, food, anything [in the safe room].

"They were a few centimetres, a few inches away from me as I'm holding the door.

"I was cold, I was sweating profusely within an instant on such a high level of alert."

Ben said he woke up to sounds of rockets being fired, something he said was "not unusual".

However, he was altered to something wrong after receiving a text message telling all those in the area to lock themselves in their safe rooms.

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He told Sky how he expected to receive an all-clear message within half an hour but instead heard Arabic voices gradually approaching his house.

The two were lay on the floor in their safe room when they heard the "tremendous boom" of their front door being knocked in.

The sound of things being smashed then followed.

"Very soon afterwards, we could hear crackling, and we could begin to smell smoke," he said.

"We understood that our home was on fire.

"It was so hot, it was so unbelievably hot. 

"I don't know how we didn't pass out.

"We managed to breathe every now and again through a crack in our blinds."

After hours in what he told Sky was "hell", Ben and his wife heard Israeli forces arrive and engage the Hamas fighters.

Hours of fighting then followed, and the pair were trapped with nowhere to go.

They sat and watched through the window their neighbour's houses get set alight and are still unaware of their fates.

The two were later rescued by IDF soldiers who pulled them through the window of the safe room as the house on the other side of the door was presumably too unstable to escape through, given the fire damage.

"A big part of me wants to leave Israel, even though we've lived here for 26 years," he concluded. 

"It's our home and all that's gone."