2024-01-20 07:51:00
Israel is focusing its operations in southern Gaza… and Al-Qassam: We are fighting fierce battles east of Jabalia
Today (Saturday), Israel is focusing its military operations in the southern Gaza Strip, which is witnessing a humanitarian crisis, at a time when the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Hamas movement, announced that its fighters are waging “fierce battles from zero distance” with Israeli forces penetrating east of Jabalia in Northern Gaza Strip.
Witnesses reported that Israeli forces bombed the southern Gaza Strip on Friday and Saturday night, especially Khan Yunis (south), where the Israeli army says the local leadership of the Hamas movement is hiding, according to Agence France-Presse.
The Arab World News Agency reported on Palestinian television that one person was killed and several others were injured as a result of an Israeli bombing that targeted a group of citizens in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip.
For its part, the Israeli army said that its ground forces, supported by air and naval forces, continued to strike and destroy infrastructure used by militants in various parts of the Gaza Strip. It added that its forces in the northern Gaza Strip detected militants operating from a close distance and trying to plant explosive devices in the area, and responded by opening fire and directing a plane. of the Air Force to strike militants.
The Israeli army went on to say in a statement that it also directed military helicopters to strike militants and thwart an operation they were preparing to carry out in the northern Gaza Strip. It also launched a raid in the city of Khan Yunis in the south following spotting six rocket launchers.
Earlier Friday, the Hamas Ministry of Health reported that dozens had been killed in raids on Gaza, including Khan Yunis, which became the new focus of ground fighting and air strikes, following the first phase of the war was concentrated in the northern Gaza Strip.
Enrico Vallaberta, a specialist in war medicine who returned from a multi-week mission for Doctors Without Borders, said: “Today in Gaza, almost everything is destroyed, and what was not destroyed is overcrowded… Work is underway with the minimum amount of medicines to ensure they do not run out.”
Displaced Palestinian children walk on a hill facing their temporary camp in Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, on the border with Egypt, Friday (AFP)
“Inhumane living conditions”
For its part, the World Health Organization deplored the “inhumane living conditions” in the small coastal enclave, whose population of 2.4 million lacks everything, including communications.
Yesterday (Friday), the Palestinian Telecommunications Company “Paltel” announced the gradual return of communications in various areas of the Gaza Strip following being interrupted for eight consecutive days, the longest period since the start of the war.
The war that destroyed the Gaza Strip and displaced more than 80 percent of its population broke out following Hamas launched an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 7. During the attack, regarding 250 people were taken hostage and transferred to Gaza, and regarding 100 of them were released. During a truce at the end of November, according to Israel, 132 of them were still in Gaza, and 27 of them were believed to have died.
In response to the Hamas attack, Israel pledged to eliminate the movement that has ruled Gaza since 2007. According to the Hamas Ministry of Health, 24,762 people have been killed so far in Israeli raids, the vast majority of them women and children.
Smoke rises following an Israeli air strike on the Bureij refugee camp during the Israeli military operation in the southern Gaza Strip (EP)
Biden and Netanyahu
In recent weeks, the United States, Israel’s main ally and main supporter in its war once morest Hamas, called on the Israeli army to reduce the number of civilian casualties in its operations, and reiterated its support for the establishment of a Palestinian state, which is an issue at the heart of the dispute between Washington and the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The day before yesterday (Thursday), Netanyahu said that Israel “must ensure security control over all the lands west of the Jordan River,” noting that he made this clear to “Israel’s American friends.”
US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (AFP)
Netanyahu stressed that “this is a necessary condition and contradicts the idea of (Palestinian) sovereignty.”
The Palestinians were quick to denounce these statements, and Washington, for its part, spoke publicly regarding its disagreement with its ally over this issue.
The day following he made these statements, Netanyahu spoke with US President Joe Biden yesterday, in their first contact in a month amid tension over the post-Gaza war phase.
In this regard, US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby announced to reporters that Biden “still believes in the horizon and possibility of a two-state solution.” “He realizes that it will take a lot of hard work.”
He added that during his conversation with Netanyahu, Biden expressed his “strong conviction that the two-state solution is still the correct path forward.” We will continue to present this position.”
Burrell’s accusations
In addition, the White House announced yesterday, following the call between Biden and Netanyahu, that Israel will allow flour to be shipped to the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip through the port of Ashdod. This comes days following the United Nations asked Israel to allow the port to be used to deliver urgent humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, which has been completely besieged since the start of the war.
Amid these developments, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Friday night accused Israel of “financing” the Hamas movement.
“We believe that the two-state solution must be imposed from the outside in order to bring regarding peace,” Borrell said in a speech in Spanish at the University of Valladolid, which awarded him an honorary doctorate.
He added: “I insist that Israel, by continuing to reject this solution, has established Hamas itself.”
He continued: “Hamas was funded by the Israeli government in an attempt to weaken the Palestinian Fatah Authority. But if we do not intervene decisively, the cycle of hatred and violence will continue from one generation to another, and from one funeral to another.”
The conflict, which caused a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, exacerbates tensions between Israel, which is militarily supported by the United States, and what is known as the “Axis of Resistance,” which includes, in addition to Iran, Hamas, the Houthis, and the Lebanese Hezbollah.
Smoke rises from a house that was hit by an Israeli air strike, as flares fall on the village of Kafr Kila in southern Lebanon, near the border with Israel, Friday (AFP)
The Israeli army said that it struck Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon yesterday, where at least three homes were destroyed, according to the National News Agency. For its part, Hezbollah claimed responsibility for three attacks on Israeli territory.
Also, the United States launched new strikes yesterday once morest the Houthis in Yemen, saying that it was acting “in self-defense” in the face of repeated attacks launched by Yemeni rebels on commercial ships in a maritime area vital to global trade.
Moreover, groups close to Iran carried out attacks targeting American forces in Iraq and Syria, which prompted a response from the United States.
There was also severe tension between Iran and Pakistan this week, with mutual bombing operations between the two countries. But the two countries agreed on Friday to “reduce the escalation.”
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