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Hamas warns that Israeli military advance in Rafah would leave “tens of thousands” of victims

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Hamas warned this Saturday that an Israeli ground offensive in Rafah could leave “tens of thousands dead and wounded” in this city in the southern Gaza Strip, the last refuge for Palestinians displaced by the war in the territory.

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In the early hours of Saturday several witnesses reported bombings in the vicinity of that town on the border with Egypt, where 1.3 million Palestinians live, more than half of the total population of Gaza. The vast majority of them are refugees who fled the Israeli offensive in other areas of the Strip.

The Islamic extremist movement Hamas, which has governed the Palestinian enclave since 2007, warned in a statement of the risk of “a catastrophe and massacre that could cause tens of thousands of martyrs and injuries”.

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The group also said it would hold “the US administration, the international community and the Israeli occupation” responsible for the consequences.

Previously, the Hamas Ministry of Health reported that 110 deaths had been reported in the Strip overnight. He also reported “intense combat” at the Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis, in the south of the territory, where one person died and where there are still 300 employees, 450 injured and 10 thousand displaced.

A house in Rafah, after an Israeli bombing.  Photo: EFE  A house in Rafah, after an Israeli bombing. Photo: EFE

Israeli forces raided the city’s other major hospital, Al Amal, on Friday.

After gaining a foothold in Gaza City and Khan Younis, Israeli forces reportedly prepared a ground operation in Rafah.

Evacuation plan

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday asked the military to come up with a “combined plan” for the “evacuation” of civilians from Rafah and the “destruction” of Hamas in the city.

“It is impossible to achieve the goal of the war without eliminating Hamas and leaving four Hamas battalions in Rafah,” he said. To do this it is necessary for “civilians to evacuate combat zones”, she added.

The population lives in maximum uncertainty.

“We are between life and death and we don’t know if tomorrow there will be hope for a truce or changes on the ground,” said Basel Matar, a displaced person from Rafah.

They warn of a humanitarian catastrophe

“Forcing more than a million Palestinians displaced in Rafah to evacuate again without a safe place to go would be illegal and have catastrophic consequences,” said Nadia Hardman, migrant and refugee rights specialist for the NGO Human Rights Watch.

The United States, the European Union and the UN warned of something similar on Friday. This Saturday, other countries added their warning voices.

The head of German diplomacy, Annalena Baerbock, stated this on social networks a “predicted humanitarian catastrophe”. Other countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Spain, as well as the United Nations, have also expressed their fears.

The United States has warned that it will not support an operation “without planning and without reflection” on the fate of civilians.

In a rare criticism of Israel since the war began four months agoUS President Joe Biden deemed the “response in the Gaza Strip” “excessive” to the ferocious attack by Hamas on 7 October.

The conflict erupted that day, when Islamic militants killed more than 1,160 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped about 250 in southern Israel.

A car catches fire in Rafah after an Israeli air strike.  Photo.  REUTERS  A car catches fire in Rafah after an Israeli air strike. Photo. REUTERS

In response, Israel vowed to “annihilate” Hamas and launched a relentless campaign of bombing and ground operations against Gaza, where 28,064 people, mostly women, children and adolescents, have so far died, according to the Gaza government’s Ministry of Health.

Negotiations are stalled

On the diplomatic front, a “new round of negotiations” began in Cairo on Thursday, sponsored by Egypt and Qatar, and with the participation of Hamas, with the aim of achieving greater access to humanitarian aid in Gaza and an exchange of detained hostages by an Islamist movement by Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

The Hamas delegation left the city on Friday after “good and positive talks” with mediators, a group source said.

A week-long truce at the end of November allowed the exchange of a hundred hostages for Palestinian prisoners. An estimated 132 people captured on October 7 are still in Gaza, and 29 of them are dead.

According to the Axios portal, the head of the CIA will travel to Egypt next week to try to obtain a new pause in the fighting and the release of the hostages.

The war in Gaza has also exacerbated tensions in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen, where Iranian-backed groups launched attacks in support of Hamas, prompting retaliation from Israel, the United States and its allies.

In Yemen, US shelling killed 17 Houthi fighters early Saturday morning, the rebel group’s official media reported after the deceased’s funeral in Sanaa, the country’s capital.

Source: AFP

Source: Clarin

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