THE israeli army, which on Tuesday announced the heaviest casualties since it began ground operations in the Gaza Strip on October 27, continues today to shell the strategically important sector of the city of Khan Younis, against the background of “serious”, according to the US, talks on a possible new truce with the Hamas.
In the early hours of the morning, eyewitnesses reported gunfire from attack helicopters around Khan Younis, the largest city in the south Gaza Strip, where according to the Israeli military, Hamas leaders are hiding. The army claims that its forces have “surrounded” the city.
The UN notes that shelling and fighting are “intensifying” in Khan Younis, while staff from the World Health Organization (WHO) denounce the “catastrophic and indescribable” situation in hospitals. In Gaza City (north), where the Israeli ground operation was focused in the first weeks, Palestinians walked through the rubble, such as Umm Dawud al-Kafarna. “I left his house from the first day of the war (…) My nieces were seriously injured, their internal organs were injured, their legs were amputated. It's tragic,” she recounted, wishing the Israeli soldiers would show “compassion.”
Mourning
THE Israeli army announced yesterday the death of 21 of its reservists when two buildings where explosives were being placed in the southern Gaza Strip collapsed after a rocket was fired at a nearby armored personnel carrier. Along with the deaths of three other soldiers in a separate incident, it is the heaviest toll since the start of ground operations in the Palestinian enclave. The official provisional tally of Israeli army casualties thus rose to 221.
In Jerusalem, over 200 people attended the funeral of one of them, Hadar Kapeluk, whose coffin was draped in the Israeli flag. The war was sparked by an unprecedented attack by Hamas on October 7 in southern sectors of Israeli territory, which killed some 1,140 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official statements. About 250 more people were abducted and taken to the Gaza Strip, of whom about a hundred were released in late November in a Palestinian prisoner swap during a week-long truce. According to Israeli authorities, 132 remain in the enclave, but at least 28 are believed to be dead.
In retaliation for the Hamas attack, Israel's civil-military leadership vowed to “wipe out” the Palestinian Islamist movement, and its military operations since then, the most extensive ever conducted in the Gaza Strip, have killed at least 25,490 people, the vast majority women and children, according to the latest report from the Hamas Health Ministry.
“Serious” conversations
A delegation of Hamas, whose political leadership is based in Qatar, arrived in Cairo yesterday to “discuss with the head of the Egyptian intelligence service a new proposal for a ceasefire”, according to a source familiar with the negotiations.
Brett McGurk, US President Joe Biden's Middle East adviser, is also “in Cairo” for talks on a possible new “cease” in hostilities and the release of more hostages, according to Washington. “I can't tell you if or when we will get there, but the talks (…) are very serious,” John Kirby, a spokesman for the White House National Security Council, said in Washington. According to a report by the American news website Axios, Israel proposed to Hamas, through mediators Qatar and Egypt, a two-month pause in fighting and shelling in the Gaza Strip in exchange for the release of all hostages.
Mr. Kerby did not want to be more specific about the possible duration of the “pause”, however he estimated that it is “probable” that these talks will result in “broader” developments in this war.
“Unacceptable” refusal
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government rejects any talk of a “ceasefire” or the establishment, in the longer term, of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.
The Israeli government's rejection of the two-state solution is “unacceptable” and risks “prolonging the conflict”, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned the Security Council yesterday. At the same time, beyond the Palestinian territories, the conflict is escalating the tensions between Israel and its main ally, the USA, on the one hand, and the “axis of resistance”, which is close to the Iran and is comprised of organizations such as Hamas, the Lebanese Hezbollah, the Yemeni Houthis, Iraqi paramilitary groups. In the early hours of this morning, Washington announced that it had carried out airstrikes in Iraq against pro-Iranian armed groups, killing at least two, in retaliation for attacks on US troops. It also made it known that it had launched new bombings, for the second time in a few hours, in Yemen, again targeting missiles against surface ships of the Houthi.
In the US, a campaign speech by President Joe Biden was repeatedly interrupted by protesters demanding a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
Source: News Beast
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