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Israel has fought fresh battles with Hamas in northern Gaza and ordered tens of thousands more people to flee Rafah as it expands its assault on the densely populated southern city despite international condemnation.
The Israel Defense Forces said on social media on Saturday that Palestinians should leave three districts close to the centre of Rafah and two refugee camps in the city. It instructed them to move to what Israel described as a “humanitarian area” on the coast.
“Our operations against Hamas in Rafah remain limited in scope and focus on tactical advances, tactical adjustments, and military advantages — and have avoided densely populated areas,” Daniel Hagari, the chief IDF spokesperson, said on Saturday night.
The UN estimates that about 150,000 people have already fled Rafah since Israel sent ground troops to the eastern edge of the city on May 6 and seized the critical border crossing with Egypt. The IDF claims that 300,000 people have so far evacuated the area, which previously housed more than 1mn displaced Palestinians.
The IDF also said it was continuing operations against “Hamas terror targets” in the northern city of Jabalia and the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City, with fierce fighting reported on Israeli and Palestinian social media accounts.
In local media, Israeli military analysts criticised the need for the fresh offensives into the two neighbourhoods after Hamas forces moved back into the areas. Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has refused to put forward a realistic plan for an alternative postwar governing regime in Gaza that would replace Hamas rule.
The IDF offensive on Rafah has complicated diplomatic efforts to broker a deal to secure the release of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza and halt the war, while straining Israel’s relations with the Biden administration.
US President Joe Biden has told Israel that Washington will not supply certain offensive weapons if it proceeds with a full-scale assault on Rafah.
The US has already paused the delivery of some arms to Israel, including 3,500 bombs, over concerns about how they could be used in the city. That marks the first time the US has placed any conditions on arms deliveries to Israel since the war in Gaza erupted after Hamas’s October 7 attack.
UK foreign secretary Lord David Cameron on Sunday again warned Israel over the impact of the Rafah operation on civilians, but rejected calls for an arms embargo on the Jewish state.
“I still don’t think it would be a wise path,” Cameron said about halting weapons sales in an interview with Sky News. “It would strengthen Hamas, it would weaken Israel, and it would make a hostage deal less likely.”
Western states and UN aid agencies have repeatedly warned that an attack on Rafah, teeming with tent cities and those displaced from fighting in other parts of the enclave, would have disastrous humanitarian consequences. The war between Israel and Hamas has devastated Gaza, forced an estimated 80 per cent of the strip’s 2.3mn population from their homes and raised the spectre of famine and disease.
Israel insists it has no choice but to continue with its campaign against Hamas, saying the militant group’s last four intact battalions are in the southern city.
Netanyahu, who faces calls from far-right members of his governing coalition to press on, has publicly shrugged off US pressure to consider an end to the fighting even as Israel becomes more isolated internationally.
The prime minister said last week that Israel would “stand alone”, adding that “if we have to, we will fight with our fingernails”.
Netanyahu has vowed to eradicate Hamas and pursue “total victory” after the militant group launched its October attack on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and seizing 250 hostages, according to Israeli officials. About 130 Israelis and foreign nationals remain in captivity, but several dozen of those are already confirmed by Israeli intelligence to be dead.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive on Gaza has killed almost 35,000 people, according to Palestinian health officials.
Talks mediated by the US, Qatar and Egypt to broker a hostage and ceasefire deal broke down earlier this week after mediators failed to narrow the gaps between the warring parties over the terms of an agreement and after Israel attacked Rafah.
Netanyahu has insisted that Israel needs to maintain military pressure on Hamas alongside diplomatic efforts to secure a hostage deal.
But John Kirby, US national security spokesman, said on Thursday Washington believed “that any kind of major Rafah ground operation would actually strengthen” the hand of Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s leader.
“If I’m Mr Sinwar and I’m sitting down in my tunnel . . . and I’m seeing innocent people falling victim to major significant combat operations in Rafah then I have less and less incentive to want to come to the negotiating table,” Kirby said.
“I can cast Israel in the worst possible way . . . It just gives him more ammunition for his twisted narrative.”
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