Deadly bombings targeted the Gaza Strip on Monday, where Israel continues its offensive against Hamas in the town of Rafah and says it is determined to defeat the Palestinian Islamist movement, despite calls for a ceasefire.
The United States on Sunday called on Hamas to accept an Israeli plan presented Friday by American President Joe Biden for a ceasefire after almost eight months of war.
But the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, reaffirmed after the announcement of this plan his determination to continue the war until the elimination of Hamas, author of a bloody attack on October 7 against Israel, and the release of the hostages removed that day.
The Israeli army continues its ground offensive in Rafah, a border town with Egypt in the south of the Palestinian territory, to destroy the last battalions of Hamas.
On Monday, airstrikes and artillery fire targeted Rafah, mainly the Tal al-Sultan area in the west of the city, according to a witness. Another witness reported intense fighting in eastern Khan Yunis, a few kilometers away.
During the night, at least 20 people died in strikes and artillery fire, including six in the Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip and ten in the Armadhiya area of Khan Yunis, according to reports. medical sources.
Four bodies were taken out of two bombed houses in Zeitoun, a district of Gaza City in the north, according to civil defense.
The army announced that it had struck “more than 50 targets” the day before across the Gaza Strip and was carrying out “targeted operations in the Rafah sector”.
“Overwhelmed” by sewers
The ground offensive on Rafah that began on May 7 pushed, according to the UN, around a million Palestinians to flee.
In the ruins of Khan Younès, residents tried on Sunday to evacuate the sewers which invaded the tents pitched between the skeletons of the buildings. Others made their way through pools of grayish water cluttered with rubbish.
“The wastewater overwhelmed us,” Abdul Samad Barbakh, a resident of the town, told AFP.
“Mosquitoes bite us and our children all night long. There is no drinking water. There isn’t even a water seller on the streets. There isn’t even any sea water,” said a man, Said Ashour.
The war broke out on October 7 when Hamas commandos infiltrated from Gaza carried out an attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,190 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count made from official Israeli data.
Of the 252 people kidnapped during the attack, 121 are still held hostage in Gaza, of whom 37 are dead, according to the Israeli army.
The Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed 36,439 people so far, according to data from the Health Ministry of the Hamas-led Gaza government.
The war has also inflamed tensions in the region. During the night from Sunday to Monday, Israel struck a factory near Aleppo in northern Syria, killing 16 pro-Iranian fighters, both Syrian and foreign, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Qatar, the United States and Egypt, mediators in the conflict, jointly called on Saturday “Hamas and Israel to finalize the ceasefire agreement based on the principles set out by President Joe Biden.”
Netanyahu under pressure
This road map proposed by Israel provides in a first phase, according to Joe Biden, a six-week ceasefire accompanied by an Israeli withdrawal from densely populated areas of Gaza, the release of certain hostages, notably women and sick people, and Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
The ceasefire could become “permanent” if Hamas “respects its commitments”, according to Mr. Biden.
But Benjamin Netanyahu, under very strong pressure from public opinion and his far-right allies, affirmed on Saturday that the “conditions” for achieving a “permanent ceasefire” had not changed and included the “destruction” of the Islamist movement, in power in Gaza since 2007, as well as the “release of all hostages”.
Hamas said it considered the road map “positively” but also reiterated its demands for a permanent ceasefire and a total Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.
On Sunday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken “welcomed Israel’s willingness to reach an agreement and affirmed that it was up to Hamas to accept it,” during a telephone interview with the Israeli Minister of Security. Defense, Yoav Gallant, according to the State Department.
“Children are dying of hunger”
In the territory besieged by Israel, hit by a major humanitarian disaster, the Rafah crossing point with Egypt, crucial for the delivery of international aid, has been closed since the Israeli army took control of it on May 7 on the Palestinian side.
According to humanitarian organizations, the aid entering the Gaza Strip is insufficient and does not reach the people who need it most.
In a hospital in Deir al-Balah, a 33-year-old woman, Amira al-Taweel, said she could not find milk for her malnourished baby. “Youssef needs milk, in addition to his medical treatment, but there is none in Gaza,” this woman told AFP, holding the little boy on a drip in her arms.
“Children are dying of starvation,” warned World Health Organization spokesperson Margaret Harris on Saturday.