CAIRO/JERUSALEM:
Israeli warplanes pounded the northern Gaza Strip for a second day on Wednesday in a fierce offensive that shattered weeks of comparative calm, and Israel said it was moving ahead with plans for an all-out assault on Rafah in the south.
After a sharp Israeli retreat earlier this month, Palestinians at both ends of the Gaza Strip again fled for their lives from what they described as some of the worst shelling of the war.
A spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government said Israel was “moving forward” with its plans for a ground operation in Rafah, but did not give a timetable.
Western countries, including Israel’s closest ally the United States, have pleaded with it to stop attacking the city on the southern tip of Gaza, which is home to more than half the enclave’s population of 2.3 million.
At the White House, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Washington was still in talks with Israel over Rafah and officials from both countries were expected to meet in person again soon.
“We had very detailed discussions to talk about not only our concerns, but also our view that there is a different way to deal with the Hamas threat in Rafah,” he told reporters.
A senior Israeli defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, claimed that Israel was prepared to evacuate civilians ahead of its attack and had purchased 40,000 tents that could house 10-12 people each. All that was left was for Netanyahu to give the order.
IDPs who have taken refuge in Rafah are considering whether to leave again. Tamer Al-Burai, who fled Gaza City and now lives in Rafah in a tent complex with seven large family households, said the entire group is heading north “since Israel is sounding more serious in its threats this year.” time”.
“We have women, children, elderly and sick people, who may have problems escaping if the invasion happens suddenly,” he told Reuters via a chat app. “The incursions are under heavy fire and people are dying as they flee. So we decided to leave earlier.”
Hamas released a video of a captive
At the opposite end of Gaza to the north, the town of Beit Lahiya came under heavy shelling for a second day on Wednesday, a day after the Israeli army ordered residents from four neighborhoods to declare a “dangerous combat zone”.
Israel claimed its operations there were targeting areas from where Islamic Jihad’s armed wing fired rockets at two Israeli border settlements on Tuesday.
Hamas released a video on Wednesday that apparently showed Israeli-American hostage Hersh Goldberg-Paulin, 23, alive. His father, Jonathan Pauline, urged the leaders to reach a ceasefire agreement.
“We are relieved to see him alive, but we are also concerned for his health and well-being, as well as for all the other hostages and all those suffering in this area,” his father said in a video.
The war, now in its seventh month, has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities. The invasion has devastated much of the enclave, displacing most of its 2.3 million residents and creating a humanitarian crisis.
In the past 24 hours, Israeli strikes have killed at least 79 Palestinians and wounded 86, Gaza’s health ministry said.
In US protests, some broken up by police against Israel’s campaign in Gaza are spreading to college campuses, as are concerns about Jewish students facing bullying or anti-Semitism.
Democratic US President Joe Biden, who is seeking re-election in November, has seen his staunch support for Israel erode support among Democratic voters.
Asked about the protests, the White House took a cautious line on Wednesday. Biden’s spokeswoman, Karin Jean-Pierre, said the president believes free speech and non-discrimination are important on college campuses and students should feel safe.
Residents in northern Gaza, many of whom have begun returning to homes abandoned in the first phase of the war, described on Wednesday some of the heaviest shelling since the first weeks of the war.
“We don’t know why all this is happening. Is it because… we finally got some help after months of starvation and the Israelis didn’t like that?” said Mohammad Jamal, 29, a resident of Gaza City.
In Washington, Sullivan said the US has seen a marked increase in aid reaching Gaza and particularly vulnerable northern Gaza since Biden and Netanyahu spoke on April 4. Sullivan said the aid flow must be increased further, a repeated US demand.
The comment came after the UN aid agency UNRWA announced on Tuesday that the number of aid trucks entering the enclave had reached its highest point so far in the conflict.
At the Nasser hospital complex, the main medical facility in the south, authorities said they had recovered more bodies from a mass grave, bringing the total to 334.
Palestinians say Israeli troops buried bodies there with bulldozers to cover up the crimes. The Israeli military denies this, although it says its troops dug up some bodies at the site and reburied them after tests to make sure there were no hostages.
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