LAST UPDATE | 28 Oct 2023
ISRAELI DEFENCE FORCES have dropped leaflets from their fighter jets, whilst flying over Northern Gaza, which warn citizens to evacuate south.
The leaflets told citizens that the area was now a “battlefield”. Israeli forces have stepped up their air campaign against Hamas militants in the Palestinian territory.
“To the residents of the Gaza Strip: The Gaza governorate (Gaza City) has become a battlefield. Shelters in northern Gaza and Gaza governorate are not safe,” the army said in leaflets dropped by fighter jets, as it urged residents to “evacuate immediately” to the south.
On X, formerly Twitter, this afternoon, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) claimed this is a measure which has been done by its forces many times over the last number of weeks.
The IDF also shared a video on X which told the citizens that the measure is “temporary”.
IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said: “This is a temporary measure. Moving back to Northern Gaza will be possible once the intense hostilities end.”
An urgent message for the residents of Gaza: pic.twitter.com/GAW3a7lWt8
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) October 28, 2023
Hagari added that the IDF intend to “neutralise” the threat of Hamas from the area.
Hamas’s armed wing said it was ready to release the hostages it abducted during its shock attack on 7 October if Israel freed all Palestinians held in its prisons.
“The price to pay for the large number of enemy hostages in our hands is to empty the (Israeli) prisons of all Palestinian prisoners,” Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades spokesman Abu Obeida said in a statement broadcast by the Hamas-run Al-Aqsa television channel.
“If the enemy wants to close this file of detainees in one go, we are ready for it. If it wants to do it step-by-step, we are ready for that too.”
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres sharply criticized the “unprecedented escalation” of bombardments on Gaza and urged an “immediate” ceasefire.
“Instead of the pause” he had expected, there has been “an unprecedented escalation of the bombardments and their devastating impacts, undermining the referred humanitarian objectives,” Guterres said on a visit to Doha.
The IDF confirmed that it was still on the ground inside Northern Gaza today, as Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu that fighting inside the Gaza Strip would be “long and difficult”.
“The war in the [Gaza] Strip will be long and difficult and we are prepared for it,” Netanyahu told a news conference after meeting families of hostages held in Gaza.
Netanyahu told reporters at press conference this evening that Israel would explore “every option” to secure the release of more than 220 hostages taken by Palestinian militants to Gaza.
Earlier, Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel’s war against Palestinian militant group Hamas has “entered a new phase” with the intense overnight bombing of the Gaza Strip.
“We have entered a new phase in the war. Last night the ground in Gaza shook. We attacked above ground and below ground,” Gallant said in a video statement, alluding to the network of military tunnels Hamas has built under Gaza.
“The instructions to the forces are clear: the action will continue until further notice.”
Israel launched its withering bombardment of Gaza after Hamas gunmen stormed across the border on 7 October, killing 1,400 people, mostly civilians, and taking nearly 230 others hostage, according to Israeli officials.
The health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip said today that Israeli strikes have killed 7,703 people, more than 3,000 of them children.
The latest Israeli raids were one of the most intense nights of attacks since the war began and coincided with ground operations.
With tens of thousands of troops massed along the Gaza border ahead of an expected full-blown invasion, Israeli forces had also made limited ground incursions on Wednesday and Thursday nights.
“Hundreds of buildings and houses were completely destroyed and thousands of other homes were damaged,” said Gaza Civil Defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal.
The intense bombardment had “changed the landscape” of northern Gaza, he told AFP.
Hundreds of Hamas fighters crossed the Israeli border in vehicles, by air and sea on 7 October, indiscriminately killing civilians in the streets, in their homes and at an outdoor rave party.
The unprecedented attack caught Israel off guard and exposed serious intelligence failings.
“The army entered the Gaza Strip and extended its operations” with tanks and artillery, Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said on Saturday.
Israeli fighter jets hit 150 “terror tunnels, underground combat spaces and additional underground infrastructure” and “several Hamas terrorists were killed”, the army said.
The military also published images purporting to show strikes and its tanks manoeuvring within the Gaza Strip.
Hamas’s armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said it was “confronting an Israeli ground incursion” in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip and east Bureij in the centre.
Israeli warplanes flew overhead today and regular concussive booms could be heard coming from Gaza, where many buildings lay in ruins, AFP journalists saw.
A thick haze of smoke covered Gaza and southern Israel after the night of heavy bombardment.
“There are a large number of martyrs and a large number of survivors under the rubble, and we cannot reach them,” a Gaza civil defence official said.
The families of Israeli hostages held by Hamas demanded today an immediate government explanation about their fate after the army intensified strikes on Gaza.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, which represents some 229 people believed abducted by Hamas, said the war cabinet failed to explain to relatives whether the ground operation endangered the captives’ well-being.
“The families are worried about the fate of their loved ones and are waiting for an explanation. Every minute feels like eternity,” the group said.
On Thursday, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades said “almost 50″ hostages had been killed in Israeli bombing raids since 7 October. AFP could not immediately verify the figure.
Hamas said all internet connections and communications across Gaza had been cut, accusing Israel of taking the measure “to perpetrate massacres with bloody retaliatory strikes from the air, land and sea”.
Human Rights Watch also warned the near-total telecommunications blackout in Gaza risked providing cover for “mass atrocities”.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said the communications outage had disrupted ambulance services.
Lynne Hastings, the UN humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian territories, also stressed on X that “hospitals & humanitarian operations can’t continue without communications”.
Billionaire Elon Musk yesterday said that he would be extending his ‘Starlink’ service, which provides internet to areas through a number of satellites, to the area.
“Israel must immediately stop this madness and end its attacks,” Turkish President Erdogan wrote on X, formerly Twitter, today, after the UN General Assembly called for an “immediate humanitarian truce” in Gaza.
Erdogan later called Western powers “the main culprit” behind the Israeli army’s “massacre” of Palestinians in Gaza.
Israel has since ordered its envoy in Turkey to leave the country as a result of Ergodan’s comments.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio One this afternoon, Dr Margaret Harris, Spokesperson for the World Health Organisation (WHO), said the only solution is to have a ceasefire in the region.
“The only solution here, the only solution, is to have an immediate ceasefire. That’s on humanitarian grounds,” Harris said.
The spokesperson for the WHO said that it has become difficult for the organisation to contact their assistance on the ground in Gaza, as communication and power is being cut in the region.
The non-binding resolution yesterday received overwhelming support, with 120 votes in favour, 14 against and 45 abstentions.
It was welcomed by Hamas but harshly criticised by Israel and the United States for failing to mention Hamas, with Israeli ambassador Gilad Erdan calling it an “infamy”.
📽️Watch the moment when Members of the United Nations General Assembly vote on the resolution submitted by @JordanUN_NY (120 votes in favor, 14 against and 45 abstentions) at the resumed 10th Emergency Special Session on the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.👇 pic.twitter.com/k52FD6sxj2
— UN Palestinian Rights Committee (@UNISPAL) October 27, 2023
In London today, thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters marched in the city centre calling for an immediate ceasefire in the deadly war.
It was the third consecutive weekend that the British capital had seen a large rally in support of Palestinians since the attack by Hamas on Israel earlier this month.
On RTÉ, Social Democrats TD Gary Gannon also called for there to be a ceasefire and said that the communications blackout has been carried out by Israel in order for them to have a tighter control on the narrative from the war.
Gannon told the programme: “The international community has to be loud here. The resolution yesterday from the UN is welcome, but we can’t have Israel – who’s supposed to be a member that – just simply defy that call.”
Israel’s bombardment has displaced more than 1.4 million people inside the crowded territory, according to the UN, even as supplies of food, water and power to Gaza have been almost completely cut off.
Israel has blocked all deliveries of fuel, saying it would be exploited by Hamas to manufacture weapons and explosives.
“Without a fundamental change, the people of Gaza will face an unprecedented avalanche of human suffering,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell demanded on Saturday a “pause of hostilities” to allow humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip after the intense overnight bombing of the coastal territory.
“Gaza is in complete blackout and isolation while heavy shelling continues. UNRWA warns about the desperate situation of Gaza people without electricity, food, water,” he said on social media.
“Far too many civilians, including children, have been killed. This is against International Humanitarian Law,” he said.
“A pause of hostilities is urgently needed to enable humanitarian access,” Borrell added.
Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said Gazans were “not only dying from bombs and strikes, soon many more will die from the consequences of (the) siege”.
A first tranche of aid was allowed in last weekend, but only 74 trucks have crossed since then. The UN says an average of 500 trucks entered Gaza every day before the conflict.
“These few trucks are nothing more than crumbs that will not make a difference,” Lazzarini said.
Between the bombardments and the fuel shortages, 12 of Gaza’s 35 hospitals have been forced to close, and UNRWA said it has had to “significantly reduce its operations”.
Israel’s military accused Hamas of using hospitals in Gaza as operations centres for directing attacks, an allegation Hamas denied.
Violence has also risen sharply in the occupied West Bank since the 7 October attacks, with more than 100 Palestinians killed and nearly 2,000 wounded, according to the UN.
© AFP 2023 - Includes reporting from Muiris O’Cearbhaill
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