Samuel picked up the boy and fled the building.

Also on Thursday, the Mexican hostage, Rabinovich, was ordered to place two calls to Israeli diplomats and relay a demand that Indian forces refrain from attacking the building.

That afternoon the rabbi’s cellphone rang. A terrorist answered gruffly in Urdu. Rabbi Levi Shemtov was calling from Washington, trying desperately to reach his Chabad-Lubavitch colleague. The terrorist spoke no English, Shemtov said, so the rabbi found an interpreter and dialled again.

Without identifying a cause or spelling out demands, the terrorist promised to free his captives if he got what he wanted. He identified himself as Imran Babar, age 25, and said all the hostages were OK. Shemtov promised to put Babar in touch with Indian authorities. But efforts to patch an Indian police official into a subsequent call failed.

Israeli officials said there was never any negotiation with the two terrorists.

“I asked if we could hear the voice of the rabbi, or someone who was alive there,” Shemtov said. “We only heard the voice of one woman screaming in English, ‘Please help immediately!’ “

That was the last reported sign of life from any of the hostages.

When Shemtov insisted again on speaking to Rabbi Holtzberg, he said Babar replied: “You’ve already asked for too much.”