LAST UPDATE | 15 Oct 2023
ISRAEL IS PRESSING on with preparations for a ground offensive in Gaza, after giving Palestinians a little more time to flee northern areas it has vowed to target in response to the deadliest attack in its history.
Hamas fighters gunned down, stabbed and burned to death more than 1,400 people in the attack that has sparked a massive retaliatory bombing campaign that has killed over 2,450 in Gaza.
That toll makes this the deadliest of the five Gaza wars for both sides. This is the deadliest war for Israel since the 1973 conflict with Egypt and Syria.
Israel has warned around 1.1 million Gazans living in the north of the Palestinian territory to flee to the south ahead of a ground incursion which the military has indicated will focus on Gaza City, the base of the leadership of the Hamas militant group.
The military said Gaza City residents must not delay their departure but a spokesperson said late on Saturday they still had time to leave and that the ground offensive would not start on Sunday.
Since Friday thousands of Gazans who have packed what belongings they can into bags and suitcases, have tried to trudge through the rubble-strewn streets.
A stream of cars, trucks, three-wheeled vehicles and donkey-drawn carts joined the frantic mass movement south, all loaded with families and their belongings, mattresses, bedding and bags strapped onto the roofs of packed vehicles.
US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said today that Israel told him it has turned the water supply back on in southern Gaza.
“I have been in touch with my Israeli counterparts just within the last hour who reported to me that they have, in fact, turned the water pipe back on in southern Gaza,” Sullivan told CNN.
In a statement issued today, the European Union stressed “Israel’s right to defend itself in line with humanitarian and international law in the face of such violent and indiscriminate attacks” by Hamas.
“We reiterate the importance of the provision of urgent humanitarian aid and stand ready to continue supporting those civilians most in need in Gaza… ensuring that such assistance is not abused by terrorist organisations,” the statement said, adding, “it is crucial to prevent regional escalation” of the conflict.
Collective punishment of the sort Israel is inflicting on Gaz, withholding food, water, fuel and shutting off power to the city, is a war crime under the terms of the Geneva Convention.
With power, water and fuel being withheld by Israel, the patients unable to leave hospitals in Gaza face the threat of bombardment.
Hospitals are expected to run out of generator fuel within two days, according to the UN, which said that the lives of thousands of patients would be in danger.
Gaza’s sole power plant shut down for lack of fuel after Israel completely sealed off the 40km-long territory following the Hamas attack.
In Nasser Hospital, in the southern town of Khan Younis, intensive care rooms were packed with wounded patients, most of them children under the age of three.
Hundreds of people with severe blast injuries have attended the hospital, where fuel was expected to run out by tomorrow, according to Dr Mohammed Qandeel, a consultant at the critical care complex.
There were 35 patients in the ICU who required ventilators and another 60 on dialysis.
If fuel runs out “it means the whole health system will be shut down”, he said.
“All these patients are in danger of death if the electricity is cut off.”
Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, the head of paediatrics at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, said it did not evacuate despite Israeli orders.
There were seven newborns in the ICU hooked up to ventilators, he said.
“We cannot evacuate, that would mean death for them and other patients under our care,” he added.
Patients keep arriving with severed limbs, severe burns and other life-threatening injuries.
“It’s frightening,” he said.
The Shifa hospital in Gaza City, the territory’s largest, said it would bury 100 bodies in a mass grave as an emergency measure after its morgue overflowed, with relatives unable to bury their loved ones.
Tens of thousands of people seeking safety had gathered in the hospital compound.
Despite the order to evacuate more than 1 MILLION to southern📍#Gaza, many people - pregnant women, children, older persons and persons with disabilities - will not be able to flee the area.
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) October 15, 2023
🛑 They have no choice and must be protected at all times.https://t.co/61x9k6vP0B pic.twitter.com/Ayso9OhMiV
Israel pummelled northern Gaza with fresh air strikes yesterday. AFP reporters near the southern Israeli city of Sderot saw troops fire at the densely populated city, sending huge plumes of black smoke into the sky.
The Israeli military said the bodies of some of the dozens of hostages abducted by Hamas in its attacks had been found during operations inside Gaza.
Hamas earlier reported 22 hostages had been killed in Israeli bombardments.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, wearing a flak jacket, earlier visited troops on the border front line, raising expectations of an imminent invasion.
“Are you ready for what is coming? More is coming,” he was heard telling several soldiers on a video released by his office.
Israel has faced pressure from the United Nations and its allies to hold back on any invasion until civilians have been given every chance to leave. The military has not said when the safe passage windows will close.
Military spokesmen Lieutenant Richard Hecht and Daniel Hagari told separate briefings today that “a political decision” will set off any action against Hamas.
“We will be holding discussions with our political leadership,” Hecht told one briefing.
Israel has massed tens of thousands of troops around Gaza and officials say that all necessary military supplies have been carried out. Thousands of air raids have been staged in Gaza since last week’s attacks, claiming more than 2,300 lives in the densely populated territory.
Defence Minister Yoav Gallant discussed the evacuation of Gaza civilians and “humanitarian issues” in talks with US senators today, his department said.
Gallant, who has referred to Palestinians as “human animals”, stressed “Israel’s military power and our determination to destroy the enemy”.
Military spokesmen have told reporters that any invasion would aim to eradicate Hamas’ militant network and leadership so that it cannot stage more attacks.
The Israeli military has particularly singled out Yahya Sinwar, the chief of Hamas in Gaza they blame for the 7 October attacks. “That man is in our sights,” Hecht said yesterday. “He is a dead man walking and we will get to that man.”
The United States has deployed a second aircraft carrier to “deter hostile actions against Israel”, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said.
Alarm has grown over the fate of Palestinian civilians in blockaded and besieged Gaza – one of the world’s most densely populated areas, home to 2.4 million people – if it becomes the scene of intense urban combat and house-to-house fighting.
Aid agencies have said forcing Gazans to move is impossible while the war rages.
But with food, water, fuel and medical supplies running low because of an Israeli blockade, aid agencies are warning of a deepening humanitarian crisis.
“The situation is catastrophic,” said Jumaa Nasser, who travelled from Beit Lahia in northern Gaza with his wife, mother and seven children.
“We’ve had no food or sleep. We don’t know what to do. I’ve given my fate up to God,” he told AFP.
The World Health Organization said yesterday that forcing thousands of patients to evacuate to already overflowing hospitals in the southern Gaza Strip could be “tantamount to a death sentence”.
Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) issued a statement yesterday saying that the areas designated as “safe” by Israel were in fact being bombed.
“Despite Israeli announcements suggesting that there are safe areas for the population trapped in the Gaza Strip, they are in fact exposed to bombardment throughout all the territory, including in the south, where tens of thousands of people have fled following the ultimatum.
MSF called for “the most elementary humanity to be shown” and described the order to move 1.1 million people who have been deprived of food and water as “absurd as it is intolerable.”
“Our teams are witnessing the fact that drinking water is becoming scarce in the south of the Gaza Strip and the difficulty of obtaining it is adding to the distress of the population.
MSF urgently calls for the restoration of sufficient and immediate access to drinking water for the population of the Gaza Strip.
“We are extremely worried about the fate of those who will not be able to move, such as the wounded, the sick and the medical staff, who we fear will be wiped out in view of the statements made by the Israeli military authorities.
“MSF is calling for safe zones to remain in the north and for regular ceasefires. We are also calling for the possibility to flee through the Rafah crossing for those who wish to do so, without prejudice to the right to return.”
Exiled Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh has accused Israel of committing “war crimes” in Gaza but he ruled out any “displacement” of Gazans, including to Egypt.
Hamas is regularly accused by Israel of using civilians as “human shields”.
On the diplomatic front, Chinese envoy Zhai Jun will visit the Middle East next week to push for a ceasefire and promote peace talks, state broadcaster CCTV reported today.
Saudi Arabia has also pressed for an “immediate ceasefire”. Russia said it had asked the UN Security Council to vote tomorrow on its ceasefire resolution.
Pope Francis has urged Israel to provide safe passage for civillians.
“Humanitarian law must be respected, especially in Gaza, where it is urgent and necessary to guarantee humanitarian corridors and help the population,” said the Pope after his traditional Angelus prayer in Rome’s Saint Peter’s Square.
“I strongly urge that children, the sick, the elderly, women and all civillians should not fall victim to the conflict”, he added.
Israel is not interested in having a war on its northern frontier with Lebanon, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said as tensions mount between the two countries.
Israel has stationed troops and tanks on its UN-patrolled northern border with Lebanon and closed a four kilometre wide zone to civilians after deadly exchanges of cross-border fire with Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
“We have no interest in a war in the north, we don’t want to escalate the situation,” Gallant said in a video released by his office, as he visited troops in the country’s south.
“If Hezbollah chooses the path of war, it will pay a very heavy price… But if it restrains itself, we’ll respect the situation and keep things the way they are, despite them being in a process of shooting from both sides.”
Meanwhile, Iran has warned that any Israeli ground offensive in the Gaza Strip could expand the scope of the conflict elsewhere in the Middle East.
Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian held talks with Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, as Israeli troops massed on the border with Gaza.
“No one can guarantee the control of the situation and the non-expansion of the conflicts,” he said, according to an Iranian foreign ministry statement.
“Those who are interested in preventing the scope of war and crisis from expanding, need to prevent the current barbaric attacks… against citizens and civilians in Gaza,” he added.
Amir-Abdollahian also criticised the United States, which has given its unequivocal backing to Israel since last week’s attacks by Hamas.
In Washington, White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the United States feared an escalation of war, and the prospect of Iran – Israel’s long-time foe and supporter of Hamas – becoming “directly engaged”.
Iran’s top diplomat was in Qatar today as part of a regional tour that also included stops in Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.
With reporting from © AFP 2023
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