2023-12-05 10:06:58
The Israeli army intensified its operations against Hamas in the south of the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, December 5, where witnesses reported violent fighting, raising fears of a “even more hellish scenario” for civilians, according to the UN.
Engaged since October 27 in a ground offensive in the north of the besieged Palestinian territory, the Israeli army has extended its ground operations to the entire enclave, almost two months after the start of the war triggered by the bloody attack by the Islamist movement on the soil of the Hebrew State.
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Since the resumption of fighting on December 1 after a seven-day truce, the army has intensely shelled the south of the territory, causing many deaths and injuries among the inhabitants of this region and the civilians who came to take refuge there, trapped in an increasingly restricted scope.
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During the night from Monday to Tuesday, witnesses reported to Agence France-Presse (AFP) violent fighting near Khan Younès, the new epicenter of tensions, and air raids towards Rafah, at the southern tip of the territory.
The Palestinian Wafa agency also reported ” several “ killed in a strike on Gaza City, further north. And early Tuesday, the armed wing of Hamas announced that it had fired a salvo of rockets towards Beersheba, a large Israeli city in the Negev desert.
Three-quarters of Gaza population displaced
International organizations are alarmed at the risks for civilians in Gaza, where “all telecommunications services” are at a standstill, due to “a cut of the main fiber networks on the Israeli side”according to the Palestinian telecoms group Paltel.
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“An even more hellish scenario is about to come true, to which humanitarian operations may not be able to respond”declared the UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian Territories, Canadian Lynn Hastings.
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The president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Mirjana Spoljaric, who arrived in the Gaza Strip on Monday, denounced the suffering “intolerable” Population. “What shocked me the most were the children who had terrible injuries and who also lost their parents and had no one to take care of them”she added, stressing that civilians “have nowhere to go”.
According to the UN, 1.8 million people, about three-quarters of Gaza’s total population, have already been displaced by the war.
“We saw what happened in northern Gaza. This cannot serve as a model for the south”added from Cairo, Ahmed Al-Mandhari, regional director of the World Health Organization (WHO).
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Humanitarian crisis intensifies in Gaza Strip
The head of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, indicated on Monday that he had received a notice from the Israeli army ordering the organization to ” withdraw “ its supplies from its medical warehouse in the south of the Gaza Strip within 24 hours, “because ground operations will render it unusable”. But Cogat, the Israeli defense body overseeing civilian activities in the Palestinian Territories, denied asking the WHO to evacuate its warehouse in southern Gaza.
The Israeli army, however, asked international humanitarian organizations for their ” support “ pour “help with the establishment of infrastructure” in Al-Mawasi, a coastal area in the south of the Gaza Strip between Khan Younes and Rafah, where Israel is asking civilians to withdraw.
Tanks entered the south of the enclave
On Monday, the military said they were taking action ” with force “ in Khan Younes, where they dropped leaflets on certain neighborhoods warning that“a terrible attack is imminent” and ordering the inhabitants to leave. Dozens of Israeli tanks, troop transports and bulldozers entered the south of the Palestinian territory near Khan Younes, where some civilians are crowded, witnesses told AFP.
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The Hamas health ministry said Monday that 15,899 people, 70% of them women and children and adolescents, have been killed since Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip began on October 7. About two civilians were killed for every Hamas fighter killed in the Gaza Strip, senior Israeli military officials said Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity.
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“It is to be hoped that this ratio will be much lower in the next phase of the war”one of its officials said, adding that high-tech mapping software had been deployed to try to reduce the number of deaths among those not fighting.
Gaza: 4 questions about Israel’s strategy since the end of the truce
In Israel, the attack carried out on October 7 by Hamas commandos infiltrated from Gaza left 1,200 dead, mostly civilians, according to the authorities. In retaliation, Israel declared war on Hamas and promised to destroy the ruling Islamist movement in the Gaza Strip. The army announced Tuesday morning the death of three of its soldiers the day before to bring the death toll to 78 since the start of the ground offensive.
According to the army, 137 hostages are still being held in Gaza, 105 having been released during a recent week-long truce, including 80 in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. Efforts to extend the truce failed in part because Hamas did not want female hostages to reveal what they had suffered, according to a US official, accusations rejected by the Islamist movement.
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