The IDF claims it found a rocket production site in underground tunnels in Gaza. The tunnels, IDF says, were being used for storage of weapons and even as launch sites. Islamic Jihad, an affiliate of Hamas, launched approx 20 rockets towards Israel from Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip. “In the Rafah Brigade, what we’ve seen with our own eyes, we count(ed) over 900 terrorists killed, including commanders, at least one battalion commander, many company commanders and many operatives,” Herzi Halevi, Chief of Israel’s Military command said. “The current effort, and the reason we are working here week after week, is now focused on the destruction of the terrorist infrastructure and the destruction of the underground infrastructure, which takes time. Therefore, this is a long campaign, because we do not want to leave Rafah with the infrastructure intact.”
Israel has accused Hamas of using civilian infrastructure and people there as human shields, an allegation Islamic Jihad has denied.
Dismissing reports that Israel wants a military ceasefire with Hamas in the event of a larger war breaking out in the north with Lebanon, Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the war in Gaza will not be over till all its objectives are achieved. “We will end the war only after we achieve all of its goals, including the elimination of Hamas and the release of all of our hostages. The political echelon defined these goals to the IDF and the IDF has all the means to achieve them,” Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video statement.
Israeli tanks have re-entered into areas it had left from a few weeks ago. Israel forces bombarded several areas across the Strip in which scores of Palestinians are feared dead.
Israel issued evacuation orders to Palestinians on their phones asking them to leave Rafah and Eastern Khan Younis. This meant patients, both the severely injured and others in the European Hospital located in Khan Younis, had to leave. The father of an injured girl said, “It was our last escape, the last hospital in the Gaza Strip – that is operational in the Gaza Strip. There are no other hospitals. All the hospitals were destroyed, half of them collapsed, and went out of service except the European Hospital, and now it seems that it will also go out of service and there will no longer be hospitals. Whoever gets wounded, will die.”
The UN has said this is the largest evacuation order issued by Israel for Gaza since the war started in October 2023, when Israel had asked Palestinians in the north to move to the south of the Strip.
The UNRWA has said “an evacuation of such a massive scale will only heighten the suffering of civilians and drive humanitarian needs even higher.”
For those like Ahmed al-Bairam, he’s lost count of how many times he’s been forced to evacuate. This time, he hasn’t even bothered to try to carry anything along. “God knows where we will go tomorrow. It is exhausting. There is no time to carry anything. There is no transportation, basically. I have children with me and they all walk.”
