Netanyahu promises to carry out invasion of Rafah
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has escalated his pledge to invade the southern Gaza city of Rafah, saying a date has been set for the ground offensive into the city filled with around 1.4 million Palestinians, most of whom are displaced from other parts of the Gaza Strip.
The United States, Israel’s closest ally, has said a ground operation into Rafah would be a mistake and has demanded to see a credible plan to protect civilians. Israel’s offensive has pushed Gaza into a humanitarian crisis, displacing over 80% of the population and leaving more than 1 million people on the brink of starvation.
International efforts to broker a cease-fire between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas are taking place in Cairo this week. Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union.
Egyptian officials said Tuesday that mediators have presented a new cease-fire proposal to Hamas and Israel that would include a sixweek pause in fighting and a swap of 40 Hamas-held hostages for at least 700 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Israel says more than 130 hostages remain in Gaza, with about a quarter of those believed dead.
Among the Palestinian prisoners to be freed would be dozens convicted of killing Israelis during attacks by terrorist groups.
The officials said Hamas would be required to provide a list of the hostages it will release, as well as a list of Palestinian prisoners whose freedom it seeks.
The proposal also includes the return of a significant number of Palestinians to northern Gaza. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled the northern half of Gaza in the early stages of the war, heeding Israeli evacuation orders.
The proposal stipulates that Israel gradually dismantle checkpoints it had built on a new road that split the strip in half to prevent the return of Palestinians to the north.
Hamas has said it is reviewing the proposal.
An Israeli official confirmed that Israel is purchasing 40,000 tents to prepare for the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Rafah.
Israel has said it has a plan to evacuate civilians ahead of its offensive, and Israel’s Defense Ministry on Monday published a tender seeking a supplier of tents.
The Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said the tents were part of the Rafah preparations.
The Palestinian death toll from the war has passed 33,200, with nearly 76,000 wounded, Gaza’s Health Ministry said. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants in its tally, but says women and children make up two-thirds of the dead.
The war began Oct. 7 when Hamas-led terrorists stormed into southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 people hostage.
Using ‘all influence’
France’s foreign minister said his country is using “all levels of influence,” including threats of sanctions, to force Israel to open crossings with Gaza for vital humanitarian aid to reach Palestinians.
France was the first country to propose European Union sanctions against violent Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné said in an interview Tuesday with French broadcasters RFI and FRANCE 24.
He added,“We have multiple ways to utilize our influence, obviously, we can provide more sanctions … to let humanitarian aid convoys cross checkpoints” and reach people in Gaza.
Sejourne did not elaborate on what kind of sanctions he was referring to. It is highly unlikely that France would impose any eventual sanctions without broader EU support, and the EU has been divided over policy toward Israel.
Drone shot down
Israel shot down a drone over the Red Sea overnight in what the military described as the first deployment of its naval Iron Dome missile defense system.
The military said that a Corvette warship shot down the drone as it flew east over waters near the southern Israeli city of Eilat. The military released grainy aerial footage of the missile making contact with an aircraft.
It was not immediately clear who was directing the drone. Yemen’s Houthi rebels have been conducting near daily attacks on commercial and military ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, launching drones and missiles from rebelheld areas of Yemen.
The Israeli defense system, called the “C-Dome,” is a naval version of the Iron Dome, which has been used to shoot down rockets fired from the Gaza Strip for the past decade.
Trade barriers
Foreign Minister Israel Katz said Israel is preparing a ban on products from Turkey after Ankara announced it was restricting exports to Israel.
Turkey said earlier Tuesday it is restricting exports of dozens of products to Israel, including aluminum, steel, construction products and chemical fertilizers. It said it would continue the measures until Israel declares a cease-fire and allows the uninterrupted flow of aid to Gaza.
Katz said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is sacrificing the economic interests of his citizens “for his support of Hamas.”
Relations between Turkey and Israel have been frosty for years, although trade ties between the two countries are strong.
NATO-member Turkey is among the strongest critics of Israel’s military actions in Gaza.
Erdogan has repeatedly called for an immediate cease-fire and accused Israel of committing genocide in its military campaign in Gaza. The Israeli Foreign Ministry had no additional comment.
Buildings damaged
A pair of mapping experts said Israel’s offensive in the southern Gaza City of Khan Younis appears to have left over half of the city’s buildings with damage or destruction visible from space.
As of last week, over 55% of the city’s buildings were likely damaged or destroyed, according to an analysis of Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite data by Corey Scher of the CUNY Graduate Center and Jamon Van Den Hoek of Oregon State University. They say that accounts for 45,000 buildings.
Still, the damage in Khan Younis and other parts of the Strip’s south is considerably less than in the north of Gaza, where the researchers estimate 70% of buildings were likely damaged or destroyed.
Israel’s ground and aerial bombardment campaign, begun after the Hamas attack Oct. 7, has wreaked unprecedented damage on the strip, leveling apartment buildings and leaving much of the territory in ruins.