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©Reuters. Flares burn in the sky over the northern Gaza Strip amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, seen from Sderot in southern Israel, November 7, 2023. REUTERS/Ammar Awad
By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Maytaal Angel
GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli ground forces in the Gaza Strip aimed on Wednesday to locate and eliminate Hamas militants’ vast tunnel network under the enclave, the next phase in an Israeli offensive that has killed thousands of Palestinians.
Since Hamas gunmen killed 1,400 people and took some 240 hostages in a cross-border arms spill on October 7, Israel has bombarded Gaza from the air and used ground forces to divide the coastal enclave in two.
Gaza City, the territory’s largest city and Hamas’ main stronghold, is encircled. Israel says its forces have advanced into the heart of the city, while Hamas says its fighters inflicted heavy casualties on the invading forces.
Chief Israeli military spokesman Admiral Daniel Hagari said Israel’s Combat Engineering Corps used explosives to destroy a Hamas-built tunnel network that extends hundreds of kilometers under Gaza.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel had “one target: Hamas terrorists in Gaza, their infrastructure, their commanders, bunkers, communications rooms.”
Israeli tanks have faced stiff resistance from Hamas fighters who used the tunnel network to launch ambushes, two sources at Hamas and the separate militant group Islamic Jihad said.
It was not possible to verify the battlefield claims of either side.
Israelis have expressed fears that military operations could further endanger the hostages believed to be held in the tunnels. Israel says it will not agree to a ceasefire until the hostages are released. Hamas says it will not stop fighting while Gaza is under attack.
“I challenge Israel as to whether it has been able to record any military achievement on the ground up to this point, other than killing civilians,” Ghazi Hamad, a senior Hamas official, told Al Jazeera.
“Gaza is unbreakable and will remain a thorn in the side of the Americans and the Zionists,” Hamad said.
While Israel’s military operation focuses on the northern half of Gaza, the south is also under attack. Palestinian health officials said at least 23 people were killed in two Israeli airstrikes in the southern cities of Khan Younis and Rafah on Tuesday.
Since October 7, Israeli bombings have killed more than 10,000 Palestinians, about 40% of them children, according to counts by health officials in Hamas-ruled Gaza.
Washington has supported Israel’s position that a ceasefire would help Hamas militarily. But US President Joe Biden said on Tuesday he had urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to take a pause in the fighting.
In Gaza’s Khan Younis, rescuers tried with their bare hands to free a girl buried up to her waist in rubble after an attack on a house that killed 11 people, according to health officials.
“This is the courage of so-called Israel – they are showing their power and might against civilians, babies inside, children inside and the elderly,” said Ahmed Ayesh, who was rescued from the rubble of the house.
ISRAEL SEEKS AN ‘INDEFINED PERIOD’ OF CONTROL
Hamas’ armed wing said late Tuesday it fired rockets at Tel Aviv, and rocket sirens sounded in the Israeli city and other cities in central Israel.
Israelis in Tel Aviv celebrated a month after the Hamas attack with a candlelight vigil around photos of the hostages in Habima Square. Some people cried, others sang or prayed.
“I came to look at the faces of the hostages, to feel part of them. … I want to be by the side of the families whose loved ones are” in Gaza, said Valeria Nesterov, 24, a make-up artist. .
Israel has so far remained vague about its long-term plans if it will achieve its stated goal of vanquishing Hamas. In some of the first direct comments on the subject, Netanyahu said Israel would seek to assume security responsibility for Gaza “indefinitely” after the war.
But officials said Israel is not interested in running the enclave. Gallant, Israel’s defense minister, said that after the war was over, neither Israel nor Hamas would rule Gaza.
‘DAY AFTER DAY GET WORSE’
The already dire living conditions in Gaza have deteriorated further after a month of brutal bombings. Nearly two-thirds of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents have been internally displaced, according to UN figures, with thousands seeking refuge in hospitals, including in makeshift canvas shelters in their parking lots.
At Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, Um Haitham Hejela, a woman sheltering with young children in a makeshift fabric tent, said they had fled their home because of airstrikes.
“The situation is getting worse day by day,” she said. “There is no food, no water. When my son goes to get water, he stands in line for three to four hours. They have attacked bakeries, we have no bread.”
The World Health Organization estimates that 122,000 displaced Gazans are sheltering in hospitals, churches and other public buildings across the Gaza Strip, while another 827,000 are in schools.
The Israeli military has accused Hamas of hiding tunnel entrances and operations centers at Al Shifa hospital, which the group denies.
International organizations and Western countries have urgently tried to get help into the strip and foreigners out.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Tuesday that a humanitarian convoy in Gaza City has come under fire.
After a diversion, the convoy delivered medical supplies to Al Shifa Hospital. The organization called the incident “very disturbing” and said two trucks were damaged and a driver suffered minor injuries. It did not identify the source of the shooting.