Standing before the people, the Levite recounts a night of profound terror, painting a grim picture of organized public crime. His testimony is designed to reveal that the event was not merely a private injustice, but a national disgrace and a public display of immorality demanding immediate action from all of Israel [אלשיך].
The attack was entirely unprovoked, as the Levite and his concubine had no prior conflict with the local residents [מלבי״ם], yet the aggression was directed squarely at him [מצודת ציון]. Shockingly, the perpetrators were not ordinary citizens, but the prominent men and leaders of the city acting openly [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. This reality places a severe burden of guilt on the local leadership, who cultivated wicked individuals and did nothing to stop their behavior [מלבי״ם, אלשיך]. As the mob surrounded the house in the dark, the scene created a chilling parallel to the people of Sodom, who had once besieged a home with similar demands [מלבי״ם, אלשיך].
The mob's clear plan was to kill the Levite [רש״י, מצודת ציון]. Commentators offer different perspectives on the nature of this deadly threat. One approach suggests a literal threat of murder: the Levite understood that if he resisted and failed to appease the mob with his concubine, they would kill him [מצודת דוד, ביאור שטיינזלץ, אלשיך]. Under this severe threat, he felt forced to save his own life by bringing the woman outside to them [מלבי״ם]. Alternatively, the intent to kill can be understood as a euphemism for sexual abuse [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. It also reflects the inevitable outcome of such violence; since the concubine ultimately died from the abuse, the Levite certainly would have met the same fate had the mob carried out their plans on him [מלבי״ם].
Driven by the threat to the Levite's life, the attackers seized the woman by force. They subjected her to rape [מצודת ציון], an act of profound violence made even worse by the fact that she was a married woman [מלבי״ם]. The tragic ordeal ended in her death, a direct result of the relentless abuse she suffered throughout the night [מצודת דוד].