Three days after the start of a bloody Hamas offensive on Israeli territory, the world is witnessing, horrified, an escalation of hostilities. Israel responded Monday with airstrikes on the Gaza Strip and a complete siege of this Palestinian territory, while Hamas threatens to execute the hostages seized during its armed incursion if the attacks do not stop. On both sides of this fiercely defended border, people mourn their dead, including a man from Quebec, and remain on the lookout, waiting to see who will strike the next blow.
The response to this surprise attack carried out on Saturday morning by Hamas fighters from Gaza on several fronts will be of “unprecedented force”, declared Monday the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, in a televised address.
“We have just started,” he warned, announcing that “what we are going to do to our enemies will have repercussions for generations.”
The toll makes one shudder: nearly 1,600 dead at the time these lines were written. As of Monday afternoon, Israel reported around 900 people killed in just over 48 hours and 2,600 injured. On the Palestinian side, 687 people were killed and 3,700 injured, according to the Gaza Strip Ministry of Health.
“To my knowledge, since the Holocaust, there have never been so many Jews killed in a single day,” Israeli President Isaac Herzog said in a video.
A Quebecer killed at a music festival
Among the victims on Israeli territory, at least 250 were massacred at the site of a techno music festival in the desert, just a few kilometers from the Gaza Strip in southern Israel. Witnesses described terrifying carnage, with young people running across the desert in all directions to escape the bullets whizzing around them.
Alexandre Look, a 33-year-old Quebecer traveling in Israel, is one of those who died during this assault on the participants of the Supernova festival.
The sad news, confirmed by The dutywas first shared by his father, Alain Haim Look, on social media: “He [Alexandre] left us today in the land of Israel, following a terrorist attack. Like a true warrior, he left like a hero wanting to protect the people he was with,” we read in his Facebook post.
It was to continue the party that the young man, originally from Montreal, decided to extend his trip to Israel a little, without realizing that a surprise attack by Hamas would cost him his life.
“People have testified that when their hiding place was found, they [les assaillants du Hamas] threw a grenade inside, and Alex jumped on it to save the people around. I will never know if this is really what happened, but it looks like it,” said Adam Aharoni on the phone from Israel, who explains that he obtained proof of the death of his best friend – practically a soul mate, he said.
The Government of Canada declared on Sunday evening that it was “aware” of the death of a Canadian in these attacks. Three other of its nationals are also missing. Global Affairs Canada is not confirming their identities at this time.
Like other Western leaders, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned “the barbaric and brutal terrorist attacks by Hamas” and “reaffirmed his support for Israel’s right to defend itself, in accordance with international law.” Canada also calls for the immediate release of the hostages.
“Nothing can shake our support for the Israeli people,” said the prime minister.
On Monday, he also condemned the demonstrations organized in the country in support of Hamas’s attacks against Israel. “The glorification of violence is never acceptable in Canada — from any group and in any situation. […] Let us stand united in the face of acts of terror,” Justin Trudeau wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
His Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mélanie Joly, spoke with several of his counterparts, including that of Egypt, Sameh Shoukry. They agreed to work together, particularly with a view to a de-escalation of hostilities and the release of hostages.
Attacks and counterattacks
The Israeli army maintains that it has regained “control” of the targeted towns in the south of the country, but Prime Minister Netanyahu indicated that armed Hamas fighters were still in Israel on Monday.
In addition to the attack on the festival, Hamas fired rockets – more than 4,500, according to Israel – from the Gaza Strip towards neighboring Israeli towns and as far as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
Taking advantage of the element of surprise, Hamas fighters aboard vehicles, boats and even motorized paragliders made use of the imposing security barrier erected by Israel around Gaza, attacking military positions or civilians in full swing. Street.
Hamas also took hostages from soldiers and even civilians found in its path and brought them back to the Gaza Strip, a territory it has controlled since 2007. Israel estimates that 150 of its own are captive.
His army thus ordered, on Monday, a “complete siege” of Gaza, which means no electricity, no water, no gas, no food, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday. The tiny strip of land, bordered by Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea, is overpopulated with its 2.3 million inhabitants, many of whom live in poverty.
The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, urged the belligerents to put an end to this “vicious cycle of blood, hatred and polarization”.
He said he was “distraught by the announcement of the “total siege” imposed by Israel on the Gaza Strip, just like the organization Human Rights Watch, which described the decision as “odious”: “Depriving the population of Occupied territory without food and electricity is collective punishment, which constitutes a war crime. »
Israel also shelled the Gaza Strip, from where the majority of Hamas fighters emerged in the early hours of Saturday. Some entered Israeli territory from Lebanon, however, indicated the IDF, which claimed to have killed “several armed suspects”.
But Hamas quickly warned Israel: “Every time our people are targeted without warning, it will result in the execution of one of the civilian hostages […]. The enemy does not understand humanitarian and ethical language, so we will speak to them in a language that they understand,” he stressed in a statement on Monday.
A number of nationals of other countries, some also having Israeli nationality, were killed in the Hamas offensive, including 12 Thais, 10 Nepalese, at least 11 Americans and 2 French, according to the authorities of these countries.
US President Joe Biden assured Israel of his “unwavering support” and according to a senior White House official, the United States and Israel held an “in-depth discussion” on Saturday about Israel’s military aid needs. Jewish State.
With Agence France-Presse