RAFAH, (PIC)
For several months, Israeli threats have escalated to invade the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip where more than a million people were forced to relocate.
Israeli war criminals use Rafah as a pretext to achieve their delusional goals of achieving “absolute victory” and “Hamas elimination”, while the entire world realizes that it is all about their thirst for blood and destruction against Palestinians and their property.
Over the past few days, Israeli warplanes have been intensifying their bombing of the city of Rafah, targeting homes and public and private property, with no regard to the lives of thousands of citizens.
According to local sources, around 100 martyrs died in the city in less than 10 days, including 21 people who were martyred even in less than hours between Sunday evening and Monday dawn as Israeli airstrikes bombed 11 homes across Rafah.
Kerem Shalom operation
The Palestinian resistance bombed on Sunday Karam Abu Salem military site southeast of Rafah, killing 4 Israeli soldiers and wounding others.
The Hamas official Osama Hamdan said the Kerem Shalom operation has conveyed a message from Al-Qassam Brigades (the armed wing of Hamas) to the Israeli occupation army that “the invasion of Rafah will not be a picnic.”
Israeli media outlets tried to market a false narrative that Hamas had bombed the Kerem Shalom crossing through which humanitarian aid was brought into Gaza. This has accordingly led Israeli occupation forces to close the crossing.
The narrative of Al-Qassam Brigades however confirmed targeting of a military site about two kilometers away from the crossing. Hours later, the crossing was reopened.
Intense raids
Israeli warplanes intensified their attacks on the city of Rafah in retaliation against civilians after the failure in confronting the Palestinian resistance.
According to local sources, four martyrs including two children and two women were killed in an Israeli bombing that targeted a house for the Abu Lebda family in Al-Jeneina neighborhood, east of Rafah.
Whereas nine other people including four children were martyred in an Israeli airstrike that hit a house in Al-Tanour neighborhood, east of Rafah, causing significant material damage.
Another Israeli airstrike claimed the life of one man and wounded others of Al-Khawaja family in the Al-Balbisi area, east of Rafah.
Israeli warplanes also bombed two houses east of the city, completely destroying them and wounding a number of bystanders with varying injuries. The Israeli occupation army’s artillery also intensified its bombardment of the eastern neighborhoods of the city.
Agence France-Presse quoted Civil Defense teams in Gaza as saying that 7 members of the Al-Attar family were martyred, along with 9 members of the Qishta family, in a missile strike on Sunday evening on the Yabna refugee camp and in the Al-Salam neighborhood, east of Rafah.
Sources indicated that military aircraft targeted land in the vicinity of Al-Aqqad School in Khirbet Al-Adas, north of Rafah. They also reported intense hoovering of Quadcopter aircraft in the eastern regions.
Intimidation process
Palestinian human rights institutions denounced in the strongest terms the Israeli occupation forces’ continued policy of bombing residential homes on top of its residents without prior warning in Rafah, saying it is part of an intimidation process aimed at forcibly displacing residents from the border city, in preparation for a probable large-scale ground invasion.
They reiterated prior warning against launching a comprehensive attack on Rafah, sounding the alarm that hundreds of thousands of residents and displaced people have become vulnerable, especially those forcibly displaced from Gaza City and North Governorates, as the occupation army continues to prevent them from returning to their homes.
The PIC correspondent said the Israeli aircraft and artillery have been intensifying their bombardment on the city of Rafah, resulting in horrific massacres against civilians.
Displacement and catastrophic conditions
The population of Rafah has increased fivefold as a result of displacement throughout the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the war. The displaced have been living under miserable conditions inside crowded shelter centers or on the streets, in a narrow patch of land surrounded by the Egyptian and Israeli border fences.
Many of the displaced people preferred to stay in the western part of the city near the sea (Al-Mawasi) to evade an Israeli invasion from the eastern side, close to the border with the 1948 territories.
Amr Al-Haddad, a father of a daughter, said that he was displaced six times during the war and that he expected an Israeli attack, but he hoped a ceasefire agreement would be reached before that happens.
“If they invade Rafah, it will be our end, we are like waiting for death. We have nowhere else to go to,” he told the PIC correspondent from a tent in Rafah.
Unachievable goals
The military and strategic analyst, Major General Fayez Al-Duwairi, said that carrying out a military operation in Rafah is possible.
He wrote on his X account, on Wednesday, “Netanyahu still insists on invading Rafah under the pretext of eliminating Hamas and recovering the hostages. From a practical and military point of view, the goal of the operation will not be achieved because the Israeli occupation army failed to take control of any area in the Gaza Strip, where fighting is still taking place in Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia, and Wadi Gaza.”
“The ground operation in Rafah will be so different from the rest of the previous battles, whether in Gaza City or Khan Yunis, because of the overpopulation in that area. Any military operation in Rafah requires a large-scale displacement process, and this is difficult to implement for a number of reasons, which means it would result in a series of massacres difficult to imagine,” he added.
