On May 12, as Israeli forces advanced farther into the southern city of Rafah, the Palestinian population’s departure from the final area of safety in Gaza quickened. In the devastated north of the territory, where some Hamas terrorists have reassembled in places the IDF claims it cleared months ago, Israel also launched heavy shelling attacks.
It is believed that Rafah is Hamas’ final stronghold. Out of the over a million inhabitants seeking sanctuary there, some 3,000 000 have left the city as a result of evacuation orders issued by Israel, which maintains that it must invade in order to destroy Hamas and retrieve several captives that were seized from Israel during the October 7 incident that started the conflict.
Egypt, which borders Israel, has expressed its greatest criticism of the Rafah attack to date and said that it plans to formally join South Africa’s complaint at the International Court of Justice, where South Africa is accusing Israel of committing genocide in Gaza. Israel disputes this charge. “The worsening severity and scope of the Israeli attacks against Palestinian civilians” was mentioned in the Foreign Ministry statement.
International humanitarian law and a full-scale invasion of Rafah are incompatible, according to UN human rights chief Volker Turk, who expressed this opinion in a statement.
In addition to reiterating his opposition to a significant military attack on Rafah, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told CBS that Israel would “be left holding the bag on an enduring insurgency” in the absence of an evacuation from Gaza and a postwar administration plan.
Due to the lack of a functioning administration, public order has broken down in Gaza, allowing Hamas’s military wing to reorganize itself even in the most severely affected districts. Hamas highlighted on Sunday its strikes on Israeli soldiers in Rafah and the area surrounding Gaza City.
Israel has stated that it will continue to have unrestricted security authority over the enclave, which is home to around 2.3 million Palestinians, without providing a comprehensive plan for a postwar government in Gaza.
The cease-fire and hostage-release negotiations mediated by foreign parties seemed to be at a standstill.
In a Memorial Day speech, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to battle until the end in honour of the war’s dead. However, hundreds of demonstrators in Tel Aviv held candles over military headquarters during the day’s first minute-long siren call, calling for a swift cease-fire agreement that would free the hostages.
Mr. Netanyahu has rejected plans put up by the US for the Palestinian Authority, which currently oversees a portion of the West Bank that is under Israeli occupation, to rule Gaza after the conflict with assistance from Arab and Muslim nations. These plans rely on the establishment of a Palestinian state, which Israel’s government rejects, moving forward.
Approximately 1,200 people—mostly civilians—were killed in the October 7 attack, and another 250 were taken prisoner. About 100 hostages, with the corpses of about thirty, are still held by militants.
More than 35,000 Palestinians have died as a result of Israel’s offensive, the majority of them were women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not differentiate between combatants and civilians in its statistics. Israel claims to have killed more than 13,000 militants, but it has not shown any proof.
Palestinians in the urban Jabaliya refugee camp and other parts of northern Gaza, which Israeli forces have mostly cut off for months, reported intense Israeli shelling during the night. There, according to U.N. experts, is a “full-blown famine.”
Israeli artillery and jets, according to locals, also targeted the Zeitoun neighbourhood east of Gaza City, where troops have been battling terrorists for more than a week. Thousands of people have been urged to move to the surrounding areas.
“It was a very difficult night,” said Abdel-Kareem Radwan, a 48-year-old from Jabaliya. He said they could hear intense and constant bombing since midday on Saturday. “This is madness.”
First responders from the Palestinian Civil Defense reported that they were unable to attend to numerous requests for assistance coming from both regions and Rafah.
Four people were killed by an Israeli strike, according to personnel at the al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza.
The chief Israeli military spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, stated that forces were also conducting work in the northern towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun, which had been badly bombed during the early stages of the conflict.
The military branch of Hamas claimed to have launched mortar bombs at soldiers and vehicles approaching the Rafah border crossing region as well as bombarded Israeli special forces east of Jabaliya.
“Hamas’ regime cannot be toppled without preparing an alternative to that regime,” columnist Ben Caspit wrote in Israel’s Maariv daily, channelling the growing frustration felt by many Israelis more than seven months into the war. “The only people who can govern Gaza after the war are Gazans, with a lot of support and help from the outside.”
Over 1.3 million Palestinians, the majority of whom had fled hostilities elsewhere, had sought refuge in Rafah. However, Israel has now left the city’s eastern sector behind.
The majority of people are travelling to Muwasi, a seaside tent camp that is already home to some 450,000 people in filthy conditions, or the severely destroyed nearby city of Khan Younis.
A planned full-scale invasion, the U.N. has warned, will further impair humanitarian operations and result in a spike in civilian deaths. The primary access ports for aid close to Rafah are already impacted. The Rafah crossing had to close because Israeli forces had taken control of the Gaza side of it.
Cairo has protested to the governments of Israel, the US, and Europe, according to a senior Egyptian official who spoke to AP. Cairo claims that the offensive has put its decades-old peace deal with Israel, which is essential to maintaining regional security, in jeopardy. The official spoke under anonymity and was not allowed to brief the media.
According to U.S. President Joe Biden, there is “reasonable” proof that Israel violated international law safeguarding people, and his government has stated that it will not give offensive weapons to Israel for Rafah.
Israel disputes those claims and asserts that it makes an effort to protect people. The high death toll is attributed to Hamas since the militants fight in populated, crowded areas.
The Palestinian Health Ministry reported that an Israeli soldier shot and killed a man in the Balata refugee camp near Nablus, in the West Bank, where there has been a rise in lethal violence since the start of the conflict. After terrorists in the camp opened fire on their personnel, the army reported that its forces retaliated with live fire.
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