The battle of Bombay was nearing its close last night after Indian commandos stormed a Jewish centre and took control of one of two luxury hotels where dozens of foreigners had been trapped or taken hostage by armed Islamist militants.

But India’s victory was hollowed by the discovery of five dead Israeli hostages and dozens more corpses of Indians and foreigners in the Taj Mahal and Oberoi hotels.

At dawn, 17 Indian commandos abseiled down from a helicopter on to the roof of Nariman House, a residential building housing a Jewish centre where militants were holding five Israeli hostages. Among the captives was Rabbi Gavriel Noach Holtzberg, the main representative of the ultra-orthodox Jewish group Chabad Lubavitch, which runs the prayer and study centre. His wife was with him.

Commandos from India’s “Black Cat” National Security Guards stormed the building while snipers, who had moved into position before dawn, provided covering fire from across the road. “It’s the final clean-up, we hope,” a police officer at the scene said as gunfire crackled in the air a few hundred metres away.

The operations at Nariman House, the Taj Mahal and the Oberoi were to last for most of the day and take the death toll from the attacks to at least 144, including 19 foreigners, with another 370 injured.

Dozens of commandos had also stormed the Oberoi at around dawn and began moving slowly from room to room in a game of cat and mouse with two militants holed up with more than 100 guests, many of them foreigners.

At the Taj Mahal, troops were also hunting down the last one or two militants holed up in the 105-year-old landmark, where about a dozen guests were either trapped in their rooms or being held hostage.

All morning, gunfire and explosions were heard at the three sites, where hundreds of anxious relatives and bystanders had gathered to watch scenes that most had only ever seen before in films.

The first breakthrough came at mid-morning at the Oberoi, when about 40 guests, mostly foreigners, rushed out of the hotel. Another 93 were evacuated at about midday, some dragging their suitcases behind them.

Among them was Mark Abell, a lawyer from London who said that he had received a call from the lobby saying he was going to be rescued. “In about half an hour there was a knock on the door and there was an entourage of heavily armed military, some hotel staff, the police. It was great,” he said. “I’m going home. I’m going to see my children, going to see my wife.”

National Security Guards officers finally declared the Oberoi operation complete halfway through the afternoon, saying that commandos had killed two militants and freed 143 guests.

But they also said that 24 bodies had been found inside the hotel, substantially inflating the death toll from the attacks so far.

There was further bad news from the Taj Mahal, where security forces had predicted a swift end to the siege, which they thought would be less complicated than that at the Oberoi.

Lieutenant-General N. Thamburaj explained to reporters that security forces were now hunting a lone gunman, possibly with hostages, through the maze of rooms, suites and corridors of the hotel. “He is moving in two floors. There is a dancefloor area where apparently he has cut off all the lights,” he said.

“This morning while carrying out the operation we heard the sound of a lady and a gentleman, so it is possible that this terrorist has got two or more hostages with him.”

The head of the elite Naval Commando Unit, his face disguised by a black scarf and sunglasses, said the militants knew the layout of the hotel better than they did. “These people were very, very familiar with the hotel layout and it appeared they had carried out a survey before,” he said. “A very determined lot, remorseless.”

In a warning of things to come, he added that he had seen about 50 bodies lying in the Taj Mahal, including 12 to 15 in a single room.

As the stand-off at the Taj Mahal dragged into the afternoon, the forces there decided on a new approach: they started firing grenades through a window on the first floor where they believed the militant was holed up.

But the gunfire inside showed no signs of abating.

Back at Nariman House, the rescue bid had also been locked in a stand-off for most of the afternoon.

Suddenly, just before dusk, a series of loud explosions rocked the building as commandos blew up an outer wall of the Jewish centre to make their final assault.

Within minutes, the commandos emerged and one made a victory sign, prompting wild scenes of celebration from locals watching in the streets and from roofs and balconies of surrounding buildings.

The two militants were dead, announced J. K. Dutt, the head of the National Security Guards. But so were five hostages, all of whom were Israeli citizens.

Mr Dutt described how commandos had tried to rescue the hostages, only to be stopped by militants lobbing grenades at them from top floors.

Three hostages were killed as the commandos began their operation, he said, while militants killed another two as the Indian forces attempted to make their way to the third and fourth floor.

Tzipi Livni, the Israeli Foreign Minister, said that a delegation from Israel’s Zaka emergency medical services unit had tried to enter the building earlier, but were also forced to retreat by gunfire.

When they were finally able to get in, they confirmed that five hostages and two gunmen were dead. Jewish law requires the burial of a dead person’s entire body, and the mission of the ultra-Orthodox Zaka volunteers is to rescue the living – and in the case of the dead, carry out the task of gathering up all collectable pieces of flesh and blood.

The Israelis’ deaths brought the total number of foreigners killed to 19, including three Germans, two Americans and two French nationals. One Japanese, a Canadian, an Australian, British Cypriot and a Singaporean also died. Twenty-two foreigners were among the more than 370 injured.

As darkness fell and the National Security Guards and the Zaka unit combed through the debris in Nariman House, attention focused once again on the Taj, where sporadic gunfire and explosions could still be heard.

“The Oberoi/Trident is completely clear, there is one terrorist left in the Taj, who is giving us trouble and he could hold hostages and that is why we are very cautious,” said Hasan Gafoor, Bombay’s police chief.

“The toll could go up further a bit, but not a lot.” The battle was almost over, but the grisly task of identifying the dead had only just begun.

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