The Israeli army intensified attacks in Gaza, killing dozens of Palestinians in the central part of the besieged enclave, while US national security adviser Jake Sullivan traveled to Israel to hold talks with senior officials.
Sullivan was expected to press Israeli leaders on Sunday to take a more targeted approach to the country’s Gaza offensive and avoid a large-scale assault on the southern city of Rafah.
He met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and was also expected to hold discussions with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has promised to press ahead with the Rafah offensive despite warnings from the United States.
Nearly 800,000 Palestinians have been displaced from Rafah since Israel launched an attack on the city last week, according to the United Nations, drawing condemnation from UN officials as well as human rights groups.
The Israeli government claims that a military operation is necessary to destroy the last stronghold of the Palestinian group Hamas.
Thanks @JakeSullivan46 for your important visit and your continued efforts to secure the immediate release of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. pic.twitter.com/i0LKgtXs3J
– by Isaac Herzog (@Isaac_Herzog) May 19, 2024
The Israeli military carried out intensified air and ground strikes across the Palestinian territory, with airstrikes killing at least 31 people on Sunday in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
Reporting from the scene of the attack, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said a residential house was destroyed while surrounding buildings “suffered heavy damage” and were left uninhabitable.
The building, Mahmoud said, housed five families who first fled violence in northern Gaza and were later forced to evacuate Rafah after Israel expanded its military operations there.
“They fled to Nuseirat only to be killed,” he said.
Israeli forces also advanced deeper into the narrow alleys of Jabalia in northern Gaza overnight and Sunday, returning to an area they said they had cleared at the start of the conflict, residents said.
Gaza’s Civil Emergency Service said in a statement that rescue teams have so far recovered the bodies of 150 Palestinians killed by the Israeli army in recent days and that 300 homes have been hit by Israeli aerial and ground fire.
‘Open these crossings’
Sullivan’s trip to Israel — the latest by a senior U.S. official since the start of the war in early October — comes as President Joe Biden faces widespread criticism domestically for his unwavering support for Israel amid the Gaza war.
Despite saying it disagrees with a large-scale Rafah operation, the Biden administration has continued to provide military and diplomatic support to Israel. Last week, Washington announced plans to provide another billion dollars in military aid to the US’s main ally.
Israel already receives at least $3.8 billion in US military assistance annually, and rights advocates have urged the Biden administration to reduce its support as the death toll in Gaza continues to rise.
More than 35,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed in Israeli attacks to date.
The humanitarian situation in the territory has also worsened since Israel seized and closed the Rafah land crossing with Egypt earlier this month.
Desperate Palestinians were filmed climbing onto aid trucks carrying supplies being delivered via a newly built US floating dock.
The pier has been criticized as a complicated and expensive alternative to what aid groups say is a more appropriate and much simpler solution: Israel opening land crossings into Gaza to allow aid trucks to deliver supplies.
“The message from all humanitarian agencies is ‘Open these crossings’ – it’s that simple,” UN humanitarian affairs coordinator Martin Griffiths told Al Jazeera in an interview on Sunday.
“We are stuck in the south in terms of our operations because we have no fuel and the trucks can’t get through because the crossings are blocked, so we have very little to offer the people of Gaza,” Griffiths said.
Pressure on Netanyahu
Meanwhile, Netanyahu has promised to continue fighting Hamas until the group’s military capabilities are destroyed.
But the Israeli prime minister has failed to present a post-war plan for Gaza and has failed to bring home the more than 100 prisoners still held in the enclave – and faces growing political pressure within Israel.
On Saturday, as tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrated in cities across the country, war cabinet member and former defense minister Benny Gantz threatened to quit the government if Netanyahu failed to present a clear six-point vision when the conflict ended.
Gantz’s warning marked one of the strongest public demonstrations of a growing division within the war cabinet.
It also came just days after Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that Israel should not be involved in governing Gaza once the fighting ends – a statement that contrasted with Netanyahu’s previous remarks about the need to maintain Israeli control over the territory.
This story originally appeared on Aljazeera.com read the full story
