Israeli troops and tanks advanced further into northern Gaza on Monday ahead of an expected full-scale ground invasion to destroy Hamas and rescue hostages, while a captured Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldier was saved during a night mission
Video released Monday shows Israeli tanks deployed beyond the northern border, moving between buildings as soldiers enter homes in Gaza.
Tanks also blocked a key road linking northern Gaza with the south, the Times of Israel reported.
The significant ground advance puts Israel in “a position where they can observe and control what comes in and out of Gaza City,” Michael Knights, a military analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told the Wall Street Journal.
“Now they have the ability to let people out – ideally what they would do with civilians – and at the same time prevent Hamas from resupplying them,” he added.
An Israel Defense Forces (IDF) armored vehicle waits as an excavator clears a road filled with debris in a location designated as Gaza October 29, 2023. via REUTERS A photograph taken from the southern city of Sderot of Israel, shows smoke rising during the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip on October 29, 2023. AFP via Getty Images
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country’s growing ground operation in Gaza increases its chances of securing the release of more than 200 hostages by terrorists.
“Ground action actually creates the possibility, not the certainty, but the possibility of getting our hostages out because Hamas will not do it unless they are under pressure,” he said at a news conference on Monday. “This creates pressure.”
The leader also resisted calls for a ceasefire, despite Hamas’ claims that it would release the hostages if they agreed to a ceasefire.
Palestinians pray for the eight members of the Kurdish family who were killed in an Israeli airstrike before being taken for burial at Najjar Hospital, in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, October 30, 2023. AFP via Getty Images
“The calls for a ceasefire are calls for Israel to surrender to Hamas, to surrender to terrorism, to surrender to barbarism. That will not happen,” Netanyahu said.
“The Bible says there is a time for peace and a time for war. “This is a moment of war.”
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant also told the families of the 239 hostages on Sunday that “military pressure” remains the best course of action to rescue the hostages.
Meanwhile, the IDF said its troops killed dozens of Hamas fighters overnight inside Gaza buildings and tunnels, adding that a recent attack also destroyed an entire building that Hamas was using as a staging post.
During the operation, the Israeli military said it was able to rescue Pvt. Ori Megidish, an IDF soldier who was captured during the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7, the Times of Israel reports.
An image released by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on October 29, 2023 shows its ground operation in the Gaza Strip. EyePress/Shutterstock News
Megidish, who was stationed at a base in Nahal Oz when the terrorists attacked, was reported to be in good health and was returned to her family.
The IDF estimates that more than 600 Hamas targets have been destroyed in recent days, including weapons depots and anti-tank missile launching positions.
Start your day with everything you need to know
Morning Report delivers the latest news, videos, photos and more.
Although the reports could not be independently confirmed, they would set the stage for Israel’s imminent ground assault on Gaza as part of the “second stage” of its war against Hamas following the killing of more than 1,400 people in Israel.
Hamas has claimed that some 8,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the war began, many of them women and children, together an unprecedented loss of life in the decades of violence that has plagued Israeli-Palestinian relations.
As the Jewish state continues to bomb Gaza, the UN and humanitarian groups have warned that airstrikes are hitting closer to hospitals housing thousands of civilians caught in the middle of the war.
Israel has claimed that Palestinians have heeded its warning to flee the southern part of Gaza ahead of its airstrikes, but the same is not true of the north, where so-called safe zones have been established.
The UN said on Monday that airstrikes hit near Gaza City’s Shifa and Al-Quds hospitals, as well as the Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza in recent days.
An attack on Sunday hit a few blocks from Al Quds Hospital, Gaza’s second-largest medical center, where doctors treat hundreds of patients and where some 14,000 displaced civilians are sheltering.
Israeli officials claimed they had given the hospital, along with the nine other hospitals still operating in northern Gaza, ample warnings to evacuate, as the IDF accused Hamas of running posts beneath medical facilities.
A photograph taken from the southern Israeli city of Sderot shows rockets fired from northern Gaza toward Israel on October 30, 2023. AFP via Getty Images
Humanitarian and hospital officials condemned the airstrikes and repeatedly told Israel that it would be impossible to empty hospitals given the number of patients in intensive care and children in incubators.
“Under no circumstances should hospitals be bombed,” International Committee of the Red Cross Director General Robert Mardini told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court on Sunday called the suffering of Palestinians “profound,” but stopped short of accusing Israel of any war crimes as he did with the Hamas attack.
Hospitals also warned they were on the verge of running out of supplies and power following Israel’s escalation of a blockade around Gaza to prevent resources from reaching Hamas, which rules the territory.
On Sunday, 33 trucks carrying food, medicine and other supplies were allowed in from Egypt, the largest aid convoy yet since the war began.
Palestinian relatives of the eight members of the Kurdish family killed in an Israeli airstrike wait to collect the family’s bodies for burial at the Najjar hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, on October 30, 2023. AFP via Getty Images A Photograph taken from southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip showing Israeli army bulldozers crossing the border into Gaza, October 29, 2023. AFP via Getty Images
Aid workers, however, said it did not meet what civilians need after groups of people attacked the warehouses of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees to take food and basic hygiene supplies.
It was “a worrying sign that civil order is beginning to break down,” said Thomas White, UNRWA director in Gaza. “People are scared, frustrated and desperate.”
Humanitarian officials also spoke about the shortage of fuel used to power Gaza’s hospitals, water pumps and bakeries, warning that it would soon run out and create an unprecedented crisis for the more than 2 million people living in the territory. .
Israel has refused to allow fuel into Gaza because it claims Hamas is hoarding fuel to carry out its terrorist operations.
The Jewish state has also claimed that stories of shortages are false, but noted that more aid will be allowed to reach Gaza without specifying how much.
During his call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday, President Biden urged Israel to “immediately and significantly” increase aid coming to Gaza while imploring his ally to prioritize the safety of civilians and hostages in the mission to destroy Hamas.
With violence escalating in Gaza, Israel is also seeing its war trigger other conflicts with Hamas allies, including the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
The Israeli military also carried out airstrikes in Syria after that nation’s rockets landed on Israeli territory on Monday.
Violence has also broken out in the West Bank, with at least four Palestinians killed in clashes early Monday in Jenin.
As of Sunday, the IDF and Israeli settlers have killed 115 Palestinians, including 33 children, in the West Bank, the UN OCHA said.
Categories: Trending
Source: vtt.edu.vn