Rafah pounded after UN meeting on camp blaze
RAFAH, Palestinian Territories — Israel on Wednesday carried out fresh strikes in Rafah, where its forces are battling Hamas militants, after the United Nations Security Council met to discuss a recent deadly attack that sparked global fury.
Despite mounting concern over the civilian toll of its war on Hamas, Israel has shown no sign of changing course, and international efforts aimed at securing a ceasefire remain stalled.
Agence France-Presse (AFP) journalists in Rafah reported new strikes early on Wednesday, hours after witnesses and a Palestinian security source said Israeli tanks had penetrated the heart of the Gaza Strip’s southernmost city.
“People are currently inside their homes because anyone who moves is being shot at by Israeli drones,” resident Abdel Khatib said.
United States President Joe Biden has warned Israel against launching a major military operation in Rafah, but his administration insisted on Tuesday that Israel had not yet crossed its red lines.
“We have not seen them smash into Rafah,” US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.
A civil defense official in Hamas-run Gaza said an Israeli strike on a displacement camp west of Rafah on Tuesday killed at least 21 people, after a similar strike over the weekend sparked global outrage and prompted the emergency UN Security Council session.
Israel’s army rejected allegations that it had carried out Tuesday’s strike in a designated humanitarian area.
“The [Israel army] did not strike in the humanitarian area in Al-Mawasi,” the army said in a statement, referring to an area that had been designated for displaced people of Rafah to shelter.
This attack came two days after an Israeli strike outside Rafah ignited a blaze in a displacement camp, torching makeshift shelters and killing 45 people, Palestinian officials said.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the strike a “tragic accident,” while the army said it had targeted a Hamas compound and killed two senior members of the group.
The military later said the weapons it had used “could not” have caused the deadly camp blaze.
“Our munition alone could not have ignited a fire of this size,” Daniel Hagari, a spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces, said ahead of the UN session.
Algeria, which called the urgent meeting, said it had presented a draft resolution to Security Council members calling for an end to Israel’s offensive in Rafah and an “immediate ceasefire,” according to a draft text seen by AFP.
No ‘blind eye’
One million civilians have fled Rafah since Israel launched its assault on the city in early May, according to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, or UNRWA.
Nearly eight months into Gaza’s deadliest war, Israel has faced ever louder opposition, as well as cases before two Netherlands-based international courts.
The White House said on Tuesday it is not turning a “blind eye” to the plight of Palestinian civilians, but it has no plans to change its Israel policy following the deadly weekend strike in Rafah.
“As a result of this strike on Sunday, I have no policy changes to speak to,” Kirby told a White House briefing. “It just happened.
The Israelis are going to investigate it.”
He said, “this is not something that we’ve turned a blind eye to,” but added: “We have not seen them go in with large units, large numbers of troops, in columns and formations in some sort of coordinated maneuver against multiple targets on the ground.”
Meanwhile, the Pentagon said it had suspended aid deliveries into Gaza by the sea after its temporary pier was damaged by bad weather.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said Israel’s military offensive in Rafah was already taking a dire health toll in southern Gaza, and if it continues, “substantial” increases in deaths could be expected.
“There are currently 60 WHO trucks [in Egypt] waiting to get into Gaza,” said Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative in the Palestinian territories, adding that only three trucks with medical supplies have entered since May 7.