RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Israel ordered new evacuations in the southern Gaza city of Rafah on Saturday, forcing tens of thousands more people to move as it prepares to expand its operation, adding that it is also moving to an area in the north. from Gaza where Hamas has regrouped.
Israel has now evacuated the eastern third of Rafah, pushing the operation to the edges of the densely populated central area, although Israel’s advance toward the city has so far fallen short of the full-scale invasion it planned.
The order faces strong international opposition and criticism. US President Joe Biden has already said he will not provide offensive weapons to Israel for Rafah, and on Friday the US said there was “reasonable” evidence that Israel had violated international law protecting civilians in the way it carried out its war against Hamas, the strongest. statement that the Biden administration has yet made on the matter.
The United Nations and other agencies have warned for weeks that an Israeli attack on Rafah, which borders Egypt near major aid entry points, would cripple humanitarian operations and lead to a disastrous rise in civilian casualties.
More than 1.4 million Palestinians (half of Gaza’s population) have taken refuge in Rafah, most after fleeing Israeli offensives elsewhere. Considered the last refuge in the strip, evacuations are forcing people to return to the north, where areas have been devastated by previous Israeli attacks. Aid agencies estimate that 110,000 had done so before Saturday’s order, adding 40,000 more to that number.
People have been displaced several times and there are few places left in the conflict strip to move to. Those fleeing the fighting earlier this week set up new tent camps in the town of Khan Younis, which was half destroyed in an earlier Israeli offensive, and in the town of Deir al-Balah, straining infrastructure.
Georgios Petropoulos, an official at the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Rafah, said aid workers did not have supplies to help them settle into new locations. “We just don’t have tents, or blankets, or bedding, or any of the items that you would expect a population on the move to be able to get from the humanitarian system,” he said.
Israeli troops captured the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt, forcing it to close. Rafah was the main fuel entry point.
The World Food Program warned that it will run out of food to distribute in southern Gaza on Saturday, Petropoulos said. Aid groups have said fuel will also run out soon, forcing hospitals to close critical operations and halt trucks delivering aid in southern and central Gaza.
Heavy fighting is also taking place in northern Gaza, where Hamas appeared to have regrouped once again in an area where Israel has already launched punitive strikes. Israeli army spokesman Avichay Adraee told Palestinians in and around the towns of Jabaliya and Beit Lahiya to leave their homes and head to shelters in western Gaza City, warning that people were in “ a dangerous combat zone” and that Israel was going to attack. with great force.”
This week, battles broke out in the Zeitoun area on the outskirts of Gaza City. Northern Gaza was the first target of the ground offensive. Israel said late last year that it had largely dismantled Hamas in the area.
The United Nations agency that supports the people of Gaza, known as UNRWA, said that about 300,000 people have been affected by evacuation orders in Rafah and Jabaliya, but the numbers could probably be higher, as these are highly urbanized areas.
“We are extremely concerned that these evacuation orders have reached both central Rafah and Jabaliya,” Louise Wateridge, UNRWA spokesperson in Rafah, told The Associated Press.
Responding to the U.S. report, Ophir Falk, the Prime Minister’s foreign policy adviser, told the AP on Saturday that Israel acts in accordance with the laws of armed conflict and that the military takes extensive measures to prevent civilian casualties, including alerting people about upcoming military operations. operations through phone calls and text messages and providing maps of safe areas.
In the Shaboura neighborhood of Rafah, Palestinians were busy packing their belongings, preparing to flee the area. The Palestinians are being sent to what Israel has called humanitarian safe zones along Gaza’s Muwasi coastal strip. But the area is already packed with some 450,000 people and conditions there are miserable, with the rubbish-strewn camp lacking basic facilities.
Meanwhile, attacks continue throughout Gaza.
At least 19 people, including eight women and eight children, were killed overnight in central Gaza in attacks that hit the areas of Zawaida, Maghazi and Deir al Balah, according to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al Balah. and an Associated Press journalist who counted the bodies.
Israel’s bombing and ground offensives in Gaza have killed more than 34,800 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its figures.
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Mednick reported from Tel Aviv and Magdy reported from Cairo. Jack Jeffery in Jerusalem contributed.
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