On the 2nd (local time), Israeli troops entered Gaza City, the headquarters of the Palestinian armed group Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and engaged in high-intensity street fighting. They set out to destroy Hamas’s secret tunnels, and a full-scale battle took place in the heart of Hamas about a month after the outbreak of the Seven Days War last month. The Israeli military announced that it killed about 130 militants that day alone. However, as the damage to Palestinian civilians increases, with the Israeli army shelling the Jabaliya refugee camp, the largest refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, for three consecutive days, U.S. Secretary of State Tony Blinken is expected to visit Israel on the 3rd to repeatedly pressure Israel to stop humanitarian fighting.
NewsisIsraeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said in a briefing on the 2nd, “We have completed the siege of Gaza City, the center of Hamas,” and “We are attacking Hamas outposts, headquarters, and additional terrorist infrastructure and eliminating terrorists in close combat.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also said in a statement that day, “This is the peak of the battle,” and “We have achieved impressive success and have passed the outskirts of Gaza City.”
The British Financial Times (FT) reported that Israel appears to have completely surrounded Gaza City from satellite images. The western side of Gaza City borders the Mediterranean Sea, and except for this area, all three land routes have been militarily blockaded. On this day, the Israeli Air Force and Navy bombed Gaza City in large-scale airstrikes and destroyed 100 tunnels. The Israeli military claimed that the Army Corps of Engineers used artificial intelligence (AI) to identify Hamas attack targets and has attacked more than 12,000 targets to date.
Meanwhile, the possibility of an escalation of war is increasing as Iranian militias operating in Syria are deployed to southern Lebanon to support Hezbollah, following Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Yemen’s Houthi rebels, which are supported by Iran.
As Israel’s offensive intensifies, Palestinian civilian casualties are growing uncontrollably. On this day, the Gaza Strip’s Ministry of Health announced that at least 9,061 people had died in the war. Of these, 3,760 were minors under the age of 18.
In Jabalia refugee camp, where airstrikes were concentrated, generators stopped working at major hospitals. The Ministry of Health said, “We are in a situation where we have to turn off the power to the oxygen generator and the body storage refrigerator,” and added, “If we cannot secure electricity or fuel in the future, we will face disaster.”
As the humanitarian crisis escalated, U.S. President Joe Biden mentioned the need for a ‘pause’ in fighting the previous day, and John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator for the White House National Security Council (NSC), also said at a White House briefing on the same day, “There is no humanitarian need for the Gaza Strip.” “We are exploring the idea of halting the fighting in order to provide assistance and safely rescue the hostages,” he said.
Before departing for Israel on this day, Secretary of State Blinken said, “We will discuss a ‘two-state solution’ that is a sustainable peace condition for both Israel and Palestine.” Secretary Blinken, who arrives in Israel on the 3rd, is expected to meet Prime Minister Netanyahu and convey this position.
The escape procession of foreign nationals and dual nationals continues. On the 2nd, the second day since refugees were allowed to leave the Rafah border checkpoint connecting southern Gaza and Egypt, a total of 344 people were counted as having passed through the border.
Meanwhile, the Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives rejected President Biden’s request on the 2nd to allocate all military aid budgets for Israel and Ukraine and passed only the Israel Support Bill.
Source: Donga
Mark Jones is a world traveler and journalist for News Rebeat. With a curious mind and a love of adventure, Mark brings a unique perspective to the latest global events and provides in-depth and thought-provoking coverage of the world at large.