2023-12-05 01:32:00
Israel expanded its offensive on Gaza and international concern grows over civilian deaths
VER VIDEO
The Israeli Army extended its offensive against Hamas this Monday with new bombings on the Gaza Stripwhile international concern grows over the increasing number of deaths of Palestinian civilians in the conflict, sparked by the Islamist movement’s attacks in Israel in early October.
With the end of the week-long truce last Friday, fighting between Hamas and Israeli soldiers resumed in force, as well as the firing of rockets towards Israel and aerial bombardments against the Palestinian territory. The Israeli Army reported on Sunday a barrage of rockets launched from Gaza at Israel, which were mostly intercepted.
The Hamas government in Gaza and the Palestinian news agency Wafa indicated that The entrance to the Kamal Adwan Hospital in the town of Jabaliya, in the north of the territory, was hit by an attack.
Several people died at the site, according to Wafa, while Hamas accused Israel of a “serious violation” of humanitarian law. The Israeli military did not comment on the alleged attack.
Israel claims that Hamas uses hospitals and other civilian infrastructure for military purposes, something the Islamist group denies.
“Israeli forces continue to expand their ground operation against the main Hamas fronts in the Gaza Strip,” said Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari. “Wherever there is a Hamas stronghold, troops operate there,” Hagari added.
Doctors Without Borders has already treated 1,800 patients in seven days in a single hospital in Gaza; More than half of the patients were displaced by the conflict and one in five were under five years old. (Photo: AFP).
From Gaza, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Mirjana Spoljaricdenounced that the suffering of the population there is “intolerable” and renewed the call so that humanitarian aid “can enter without obstacles.”
“I have arrived in Gaza, where the suffering of the population is intolerable. I reiterate our urgent call for civilians to be protected in accordance with the laws of war and for aid to enter without obstacles,” Spoljaric said on the social network (formerly Twitter).
“The hostages must be released and the ICRC must be allowed to visit them in complete safety,” he added, the AFP news agency reported.
In the same way, the Emergency Coordinator of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in the Gaza Strip, Nicholas Papachrysostomoustated this Monday that Gazan medical personnel are overwhelmed and that the NGO had to close two primary care clinics due to evacuation orders due to constant Israeli bombings after the end of the truce.
In one of those two clinics The NGO treated 1,800 patients in seven days; More than half were displaced by the conflict and one in five were under five years old.
Papachrysostomou asserted that the ground operation in Khan Yunis is “a reality” and that the fighting in the area has tripled the population density of the south due to displacement. “It cannot continue like this,” he said, calling for a lasting ceasefire for the delivery of humanitarian aid.
Nearly 1.9 million people have had to leave their homes in the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the Israeli military offensive and, of them, around 1.2 million ended up in facilities of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees in the Middle East (UNRWA).
Israel assured that it will continue with the war until Hamas is crushed in retaliation for its attacks on October 7, which left some 1,200 dead, mostly civilians, and 240 kidnapped, including twenty Argentines.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says more than 15,800 people have died in the territory since that date, and that more than half are women and children.
Under a truce mediated by Qatar, with support from Egypt and the United States, 80 Israeli hostages were released in exchange for the release of 240 Palestinian prisoners. More than twenty additional hostages were also released from Gaza, mostly Thais living in Israel, outside the truce agreement.
Fighting resumed last Friday between the two parties when the ceasefire expired without an agreement to extend it, despite international pressure. Two days ago, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office announced that Israeli negotiators withdrew from Qatar “after an impasse in negotiations” to renew the truce.
With 137 hostages still in Gaza, according to the Israeli Army, Hamas has ruled out further releases until a permanent ceasefire is agreed.
Israeli forces indicated on Sunday that they had carried out about 10,000 aerial bombardments since the start of the war. “In the last few hours, only 316 dead and 664 injured have been rescued from the ruins and taken to hospital, but many more remain under the rubble,” Ashraf al Qudra, spokesman for the Hamas Health Ministry, said in a statement.
Since October 7, almost 16 million deaths have been recorded in Gaza. (Photo: AFP).
The rising death toll in Gaza has increased international dismay over Israel’s conduct in the offensive to dismantle Hamas. Hospitals in southern Gaza were overflowing with dead and woundedsome screaming in pain.
“I’m running out of ways to describe the horrors that children experience here,” he said. James Elder, spokesman for the UN children’s agency (UNICEF) in a video recorded at the Nasser hospital in the southern Khan Yunis. “This is the worst bombing in the war now in southern Gaza. I am seeing massive casualties of children,” she added in the video uploaded on X, formerly Twitter.
The United States, which provides Israel with billions of dollars annually in military assistance, has stepped up calls to protect civilians in Gaza.
“Too many innocent Palestinians have died”declared US Vice President Kamala Harris to journalists at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai at the weekend.
Israeli government spokesman Eylon Levy blamed Hamas for the deaths, saying the victims “would be alive” if the Islamist group had not carried out the Oct. 7 attacks.
The Israeli military has extended its offensive against Hamas in the besieged Gaza Strip, as international concern grows over the rising number of Palestinian civilian deaths in the conflict. pic.twitter.com/io79aDCuNB
— Télam Agency (@AgenciaTelam) December 4, 2023
Precautions for Israeli citizens
In this context, Israel raised the travel alert level for its citizens in 80 countries, including Argentina and Brazil, due to increased efforts by Iran and its proxies to harm Israeli and Jewish targets around the world in the wake of the war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The measure of the Israeli National Security Council (CSN), which was reported in an official statement from the organization, It reaches almost all of Western Europe and South America, as well as Australia, Russia, Africa and Central Asia.
“Since the beginning of the war, we have detected increased efforts by Iran and its proxies, including the Hamas and Global Jihad factions, to harm Israeli and Jewish targets around the world. At the same time, there is an ongoing constant and significant increase in incitement, attempted attacks and manifestations of anti-Semitism in many countries,” CSN said when explaining the reasons for the measure.
On the other hand, in a session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, based in GenevaIsraeli and Palestinian representatives accused each other this Monday of “genocide”in relation to the war in the Gaza Strip.
“The attacks (perpetrated by) Hamas on October 7 were motivated by a genocidal ideology,” Yeela Cytrin, legal advisor to the Israeli mission in Geneva, told diplomats gathered at the European headquarters of the UN.
Palestinian representative Dima Asfour stated for her part that “the human-made catastrophe” resulting from the massive bombings and ground offensive of the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip were “a textbook case of genocide.”
The accusations come on the eve of the 75th anniversary of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted by the UN General Assembly on December 9, 1948.
#Israel #expands #offensive #Gaza #concerns #grow #civilian #deaths