The Israeli Army presented this Monday a plan for the “evacuation” of civilians from conflict areas, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised to launch a ground offensive in the overcrowded city of Rafah, in the south. of the Gaza Strip.
The planned operation raised fears of a mass killing of civilians in Rafah, home to 1.4 million Palestinians displaced by the war between Israel and the Hamas terrorist group.
It is also the main entry point for humanitarian aid from Egypt, desperately needed in the face of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
“The (Israeli army) presented to the war cabinet a plan to evacuate civilians from combat areas in the Gaza Strip, along with an operational plan,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
Previously, the prime minister stated that the offensive against Rafah would only be “delayed” if a ceasefire agreement was reached.
Representatives of Egypt, Qatar, the United States and Israel, together with Hamas envoys, are holding a new round of negotiations in Doha for a ceasefire, Egyptian television reported.
“If we don’t have an agreement, we will do it anyway,” Netanyahu said of the offensive in Rafah, in an interview with the American network CBS.
“It has to be done because total victory is our goal and total victory is within reach,” he added.
Meanwhile, the situation in the Gaza Strip continues to worsen and 2.2 million people, the vast majority of the population, face “massive famine”, according to the UN.
Humanitarian aid arrives in dribs and drabs
The bombings do not stop and humanitarian aid enters in dribs and drabs through the Rafah crossing, and depends on the approval of Israel, which imposed a total siege on Gaza.
An AFP correspondent reported hundreds of people leaving their homes to go to other areas of the territory, governed by Hamas since 2007 and subjected to intense Israeli bombing since October 7, 2023.
Even so, a famine in Gaza can still be “avoided” if Israel allows humanitarian agencies to send “significant aid” there, the director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, said on Sunday.
But Netanyahu insists on his plan to launch an offensive against Rafah to destroy the “last bastion” of Hamas.
The war broke out that day when Hamas terrorists killed about 1,160 people, mostly civilians, in southern Israel, and kidnapped about 250, according to an AFP report based on Israeli data.
In response to the attack, Israel launched an air and ground offensive that has already caused 29,692 deaths in Gaza, the vast majority of them civilians, according to the Ministry of Health of the Palestinian territory.
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