168 dead and 200 wounded as a result of the Israeli bombing of Gaza
The Israeli army announced today, Monday, that it was able to release two detainees who were in the custody of Hamas. Hamas fighters had kidnapped them on October 7, during an operation in Rafah, on Sunday-Monday night.
The Ministry of Health in Gaza announced on Monday morning that the Israeli operation, which allowed the release of two hostages in Rafah, located in the far south of the Gaza Strip near the border with Egypt, led to the fall of “about a hundred martyrs, the majority of whom were children and women.”
The Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip later announced that the death toll in the Strip had risen to 28,340 dead and 67,984 injured since the start of the war.
Somaya Al-Najjar, a wounded Palestinian girl comforts her brother Yamen after being injured in an Israeli bombing on Rafah (AFP)
The ministry said, in a post on its Facebook account, that “the Israeli occupation committed 19 massacres against families in the Gaza Strip, claiming 164 martyrs and causing 200 injuries during the past 24 hours.”
She added that “on the 129th day of the ongoing Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip, a number of victims are still under the rubble and on the roads, and the occupation is preventing ambulance and civil defense crews from reaching them.”
Relatives of victims of the Israeli bombing on Rafah at Abu Youssef Al-Najjar Hospital (Reuters)
In a related context, the Palestinian News Agency reported on Monday that 10 were killed in an Israeli bombing of a house in Deir al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip. The agency quoted healthcare sources as saying that the bodies of ten dead people, including women and children, arrived at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, after the Israeli army bombed a house in the Al-Baraka area.
For its part, the Israeli army announced, on Monday, details of the liberation of two detainees who were in the hands of Hamas, during an operation in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. The Israeli army spokesman, Avichay Adraee, said on his account on the “X” platform that the two men who were liberated by the forces were Fernando Marman (60 years old) and Louis Haar (70 years old).
Fernando Marman, one of the liberators from Hamas, as announced by the Israeli army (Reuters)
Adraee explained that a joint force from the Israeli army and the Internal Security Agency (Shin Bet) was able to storm a building in which there were a number of gunmen, clash with them, and free the two men, about four months after the outbreak of the war in Gaza. He added: “The Air Force launched an intense wave of raids targeting dozens of targets of the Shaboura Brigade affiliated with Hamas. To enable the Israeli force to return the two men to Israel.
The Israeli official confirmed that the two men are in good health. A subsequent statement by the Israeli security services, reported by Agence France-Presse, on Monday, added that “the two men were transferred for a medical examination to Sheba Tel Hashomer Hospital.”
The two hostages hold Israeli and Argentinian citizenship. In a post on the X website, the office of Argentine President Javier Miley expressed its “gratitude” to the Israeli army for releasing the hostages.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel “will not waste any opportunity to free more hostages in Gaza,” and described the continued military pressure until achieving what he called “complete victory” over the Hamas movement as necessary to fully recover the hostages.
Rafah, located on the Egyptian border, is the last refuge for Palestinians fleeing the ongoing Israeli bombing elsewhere in the Gaza Strip, as part of Israel’s four-month-long war against Hamas. Agence France-Presse said that the night raids on Rafah did not appear to represent the beginning of the attack that raised the concern of the international community, including the United States. Israel’s main ally.
These raids, which were more intense than in recent days, caused clouds of smoke to rise.
Smoke rising from Rafah as a result of violent Israeli bombing yesterday (AFP)
In addition, Hamas considered the Israeli attack on the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip to be a continuation of the “genocidal” war and the forced displacement attempts carried out by Israel against the Palestinian people.
It was stated, in a statement by the movement on its channel on the “Telegram” platform, that “the Nazi occupation army’s attack on the city of Rafah, tonight, and its committing horrific massacres against defenseless civilians and displaced children, women and the elderly, in which more than a hundred martyrs have been killed so far, is considered… In continuation of the genocidal war and the forced displacement attempts launched against our Palestinian people.
Palestinians inspect a site that was subjected to Israeli raids in Rafah (Reuters)
The statement described the attack as “a combined crime, a continuation of the genocidal war, and an expansion of the scope of massacres committed against our people, given the tragic conditions this city is experiencing due to the accumulation of approximately 1.4 million citizens there, and the transformation of its streets into camps for the displaced, living in extremely difficult and cruel conditions.” As a result of their lack of the minimum necessities of life.”
The statement continued, “Netanyahu’s terrorist government and his Nazi army ignore the decisions of the International Court of Justice that were issued two weeks ago, which approved urgent measures that include halting any steps that could be considered acts of genocide.” He added, “The American administration and President Biden personally bear full responsibility with the occupation government for this massacre, because of the green light they gave to Netanyahu yesterday, and the open support they provide him with money, weapons, and political cover to continue the war of genocide and massacres.”
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2024-02-12 09:18:01
