2023-10-13 18:51:00
Almost a week after the Hamas attack, the Israeli army announced on Friday October 13 that it had carried out “localized raids inside the territory of the Gaza Strip” over the past 24 hours.
These ground incursions were intended to search for “terrorists” and “weaponry,” the statement said. They also aimed to prepare a ground offensive, which is expected in this densely populated Palestinian territory. During these operations, efforts were also made “to find missing people,” the army added.
The soldiers also “dismantled terrorist cells and infrastructure,” including “a Hamas cell that fired anti-tank missiles toward Israeli territory,” according to the statement.
The army launched the war after the bloody attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on October 7 from the Gaza Strip against Israel, which has since relentlessly shelled this small, poor territory, in a state of siege.
More than 1,900 dead on the Palestinian side
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commented on these incursions and the ongoing strikes on the Gaza Strip, saying that this was “only the beginning” of the Israeli army’s response. “Our enemies have only begun to pay the price. I cannot divulge what comes next, but I tell you it is just the beginning,” he continued in a speech to the Nation.
Since October 7, more than 1,900 Palestinians, including 614 children and 370 women, including many civilians, according to local authorities, have already died in the Gaza Strip. Nearly 7,700 people were also injured in these strikes.
“We are fighting like lions for our home,” continued the Israeli Prime Minister. “We will never forgive or forget the barbaric acts of our enemies and we will not let the world or anyone forget these horrors inflicted on the Jewish people,” he added. “We are ensuring that the war continues with the munitions and weapons that are on their way to Israel. »
READ ALSO The total siege of Gaza by Israel in the face of the “law of war” With tens of thousands of soldiers and reservists massed on the border of the Gaza Strip and the announcement of several land incursions into the Palestinian territory, Israel casts doubt on a possible large-scale land operation, the first since 2014. Israel launched a war after the bloody Hamas attack on October 7, launched in the middle of Shabbat, the weekly Jewish rest, and the last day of the Sukkot holiday.
Hundreds of Hamas fighters infiltrated Israel in vehicles, by air and sea, to kill more than a thousand civilians in the streets, in their homes or at rave parties. During this assault which stunned the country, they kidnapped several dozen Israeli hostages, foreign and binational, whom Hamas threatened to execute.
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