Zaka: The volunteers giving dignity to Israel's dead

Behind the tall, barbed-wire gates of a military base in central Israel last week, away from the public eye, soldiers, police officers, and forensics experts were working diligently on a task that was almost impossible to imagine from the outside - the mass identification of the victims of Hamas's murderous attack.

Working alongside them late into the night, under the harsh glare of floodlights, was another group, identifiable by their bright yellow vests. They were Zaka, a religious organisation which, since the attack, has been responsible for some of the toughest work taking place in Israel.

Zaka's job is to collect every part of the remains of the dead, including their blood, so that they can be buried in accordance with Jewish religious law. The organisation is called on to deal with the most traumatic events, including natural disasters, suicides from buildings, and terrorism.

Its members are almost all ultra-orthodox Jews, and they are all volunteers.

When Hamas began its rampage through southern Israel last Saturday, Zaka volunteer Baroch Frankel, 28, was observing the Sabbath as usual at his apartment in Bnei Brak, an orthodox city near Tel Aviv where many of the volunteers live. About mid-morning, he heard over his Zaka walkie-talkie that there was some kind of emergency under way.

The walkie-talkie was allowed to be on because the Sabbath can be broken for matters of life and death, but it wasn't until sundown that Frankel could look at his phone and he fully understood the scale of the attack. He grabbed his kit, containing body bags, surgical gloves, shoe covers and rags for soaking up blood, and jumped in his car. "I just drove," he said.