Israel and Hamas at war, day 227 | Incessant strikes on Gaza, Netanyahu under pressure

(Rafah) Israel and Hamas, who are engaged in violent fighting in the Gaza Strip threatened by famine, each denounce the arrest warrants requested from the International Criminal Court (ICC) against their leaders for alleged war crimes.

ICC prosecutor Karim Khan said Monday he had requested arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for crimes including “deliberately starving civilians,” “intentional homicide” and “extermination and/or murder”.

The accusations against Hamas leaders also targeted by this request for arrest warrants, notably its leader in Gaza Yahya Sinouar, include “extermination”, “rape and other forms of sexual violence” and “taking of hostages as a war crime.

The Israeli Prime Minister “rejected with disgust the Hague prosecutor’s comparison between Israel”, a “democratic” country, and “the mass murderers of Hamas”.

His Minister of Foreign Affairs, Israel Katz, denounced a “scandalous decision” and “a historic dishonor” for the court in The Hague.

The Palestinian Islamist movement for its part denounced “the attempts of the prosecutor […] to assimilate the victim to the executioner.

American President Joe Biden, Israel’s main ally, considered the arrest warrant requested against Mr. Netanyahu “scandalous”, saying that “there is no equivalence” between Israel and Hamas. He “rejected” the term “genocide” to describe the Israeli offensive in Gaza, during a reception for the Jewish community at the White House.

The head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, also described these mandates as “shameful”, warning that they “could compromise” negotiations on a ceasefire in Gaza, and adding that the ICC did not “jurisdiction” over Israel.

France “supports” the ICC and its “independence”, the Quai d’Orsay said in a statement, saying it both condemned the “anti-Semitic massacres perpetrated by Hamas” and denounced “the unacceptable nature of civilian losses in the gang.” of Gaza.”

The war was sparked by a Hamas attack on Israeli soil on October 7, which resulted in the death of more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP report based on official Israeli data. Of the 252 people then taken as hostages, 124 are still detained in Gaza, of whom 37 have died according to the army.

The bodies of four hostages, found last week in Gaza, were found in tunnels in Jabalia (north), the army said Monday evening, according to which Ron Benjamin, Shani Louk, Amit Buskila and Itzhak Gelerente had been killed from October 7 on Israeli soil and their remains transported to Gaza.

Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas, which took power in Gaza in 2007 and which it describes as terrorist, as have the United States and the European Union.

His army launched a devastating offensive in the Gaza Strip which it besieged, resulting in the deaths of at least 35,562 people, most of them civilians, including 106 in the last 24 hours, according to data from the Health Ministry on Monday. of the Hamas-led Gaza government.

The military operations also caused a humanitarian catastrophe. The majority of the approximately 2.4 million inhabitants are threatened with famine and more than half displaced, according to the UN.

“Killed in our sleep”

Israeli military planes and helicopters carried out new strikes on Monday on the Gaza Strip, where ground fighting is also taking place between Palestinian soldiers and armed groups.

In the northern Palestinian territory, the air force bombarded Gaza City and the Jabalia refugee camp, where the army reported “perhaps the fiercest” fighting since October.

In the south, a strike hit a house in the Tal al-Sultan neighborhood, west of the city of Rafah, killing three and wounding eight, according to hospital sources.

“We are being killed in our homes in our sleep, civilians including children and women are dying and no one cares about us,” laments Obeid Khafaja, a resident of Tal al-Sultan.

” The duty ”

Despite opposition from many capitals and humanitarian organizations to a major ground operation in Rafah, the Israeli defense minister insisted on “Israel’s duty to expand the ground operation in Rafah, to dismantle Hamas and to return the hostages,” while receiving White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan this weekend.

Since May 7, when Israel took control of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt on the Palestinian side, the delivery of humanitarian aid has virtually stopped. This passage is crucial for aid, including fuel, essential for hospitals and humanitarian logistics.

To compensate for the restrictions imposed by Israel, the United States has worked on a temporary jetty project which received these first shipments of humanitarian aid by sea this weekend.

According to the US Middle East Command (CENTCOM), 569 tonnes of aid have so far been transported to Gaza through this jetty.

” Action plan ”

With no prospect of an end to hostilities in sight, Mr Netanyahu is under pressure to prepare a strategy for Gaza’s future.

Sunday in Jerusalem, Mr. Sullivan called on him to accompany military operations with a “political strategy” for the future of the Palestinian territory.

Benny Gantz, former head of the army and current member of the war cabinet, has threatened to resign if a “action plan” for the post-war period is not adopted quickly. Mr Gallant called on Mr Netanyahu to “immediately prepare” a “governmental alternative to Hamas”.

For his part, the UN envoy for the Middle East, Tor Wennesland, called on the parties to “return immediately and in good faith to the negotiating table” in order to achieve a ceasefire after the failure of the last talks at the beginning of May.