Isreal is expanding ground operations in Gaza and its fighter jets have struck hundreds more Hamas targets, the Israeli military said yesterday, in what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called the second phase of a three-week-old war.
Telephone and Internet communications were partially restored in Gaza after a more than day-long blackout that had badly impacted rescue operations as Israel pounded Hamas targets. Medical authorities in the Gaza Strip, which has a population of 2.3 million people, yesterday said 8,005 Palestinians – including 3,324 minors – had been killed in Israel’s assault.
“Israel cut us off from the world in order to wipe us out, but we are hearing the sounds of explosions and we are proud the resistance fighters have stopped them at metres’ distance,” said Shaban Ahmed, a public servant who stayed in Gaza City despite an Israeli warning to evacuate south. Ahmed said he only found out yesterday that his cousin had been killed in an air strike on Friday because of the blackout.
Israeli Defence Force fighter jets struck over 450 military targets belonging to Hamas in the Gaza Strip, including operational command centres, observation posts, and anti-tank missile launch posts. “We are gradually expanding the ground activity and the scope of our forces in the Gaza Strip,” military spokesman Daniel Hagari told a briefing.
“We will do everything we can from the air, sea and land to ensure the safety of our forces and achieve the goals of the war.” Pope Francis yesterday called for a ceasefire and renewed his call for the release of all hostages.Israeli air and ground forces have stepped up operations in the Gaza Strip amid reports of heavy bombing of the besieged enclave.
Internet and mobile phone services were cut off in the Palestinian territory, a local telecoms firm and the Red Crescent said.
“In the last hours, we intensified the attacks in Gaza,” Israel’s chief military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told a televised news briefing, raising expectations that the long-anticipated ground invasion of Gaza may be beginning.
He said the air force was conducting extensive strikes on tunnels and other infrastructure.
“In addition to the attacks carried out in the last few days, ground forces are expanding their operations tonight,” he said.
Israeli forces have massed outside Gaza, where Israel has been conducting an intense campaign of aerial bombardment since October 7.
Earlier yesterday, Palestinians said they received renewed Israeli military warnings to move from Gaza’s north to the south to avoid the deadliest theatre of the war.
Palestinian mobile phone service provider Jawwal said services including phone and Internet had been cut by heavy bombardment. A statement from the Palestine Red Crescent Society said it had completely lost contact with its operations room in Gaza and all its teams operating on the ground.
A ground invasion would exacerbate what aid groups call a humanitarian crisis in Gaza following days of aerial bombardment that Hamas health authorities say have killed more than 7,000 Palestinians.
Much of the infrastructure of Gaza has been shattered by the bombing. Power has been cut for days, crippling treatment facilities and depriving Gazans of fresh water, while half of its housing stock has been damaged and 20,000 residential units destroyed or rendered uninhabitable, according to the Hamas media office.
Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Al Safadi last night said that Israel had just launched a ground war on Gaza, adding that “outcome will be a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions for years to come.”
The head of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East said the world cannot continue to “turn a blind eye” to the “hell on Earth” in Gaza.
The enclave had all but run out of fuel and was on the brink of a “massive health hazard”, Philippe Lazzarini said.
“We cannot turn a blind eye to this human tragedy,” he added.
“History will ask why the world did not have the courage to act decisively and stop this hell on Earth. Our aid operation is crumbling. For the first time ever, they report that people are hungry.”
Lazzarini rejected claims that aid passing through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt would be allowed to fall into the hands of fighters.
“The UNRWA does not, and will not, divert humanitarian assistance to the wrong hands,” he said.
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