Israeli forces continued ground operations in the Gaza Strip throughout Saturday, targeting several Hamas operatives and positions, the military said.
At the same time, the IDF warned residents of Gaza City that the area was now a “battlefield” as it stepped up its air campaign against Hamas terrorists in the Palestinian territory.
“To the residents of the Gaza Strip: Gaza Governorate (Gaza City) has become a battlefield. “Shelters in northern Gaza and Gaza Governorate are not safe,” the army said in leaflets dropped from warplanes, urging residents to “immediately” evacuate to the south.
Israel has repeatedly warned that it is heavily targeting Gaza City and other areas of northern Gaza, where Hamas is believed to have its main bases of operations and extensive underground facilities, many of which lie beneath the city. The military has been pushing around a million civilians to relocate to the south of the Gaza Strip for two weeks. Many have done so, but hundreds of thousands are believed to remain.
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In addition, several volleys of rockets were fired from Gaza into southern and central Israel on Saturday. Rockets hit the central cities of Kiryat Ono and Holon. A rocket hit a house in Ramat Gan. There were no injuries in any of the incidents.
Another rocket hit a house in the southern city of Beersheba, causing damage but no injuries. A house in Ashdod was hit, there were no injuries.
Hamas also claimed to have fired rockets at Dimona, the site of an Israeli nuclear reactor. There were no reports of an impact in the city.
At the same time, the Assuta Medical Center in Ashdod announced the death of a 9-year-old girl who suffered cardiac arrest last week when a missile siren was activated in the southern port city.
Israel has been fighting Hamas since October 7, when around 2,500 terrorists poured into Israel by land, sea and air, killing over 1,400 people, most of them civilians in their homes and at an outdoor music festival. Hamas and allied terrorist groups also dragged more than 230 hostages – including about 30 children – to the Gaza Strip, where they remain trapped.
At a news conference on Saturday evening, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his heart was broken after meeting the families of those abducted and promised: “We will use every opportunity to bring our abducted brothers and sisters back into the arms of their families.”
“Their abduction is a crime against humanity,” he said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference about the war against the Hamas terror group ruling Gaza on October 28, 2023. (YouTube screenshot; used in accordance with clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
Netanyahu also called those who dare “accuse our soldiers of war crimes” hypocrites and liars. Many around the world now understand what Israel has been saying for years, he continued: “Israel is waging not just its war, but humanity’s war against the barbarians.”
And War Cabinet member Benny Gantz said there was “no diplomatic time limit” on the war, “just an operational clock.”
Continued limited ground operations as Gaza is hit by airstrikes
The IDF said that in ground operations that began Friday evening, troops attacked terrorist cells attempting to carry out anti-tank rocket and mortar attacks.
In addition, ground troops found and destroyed a booby-trapped house, the IDF said.
During the raid, the IDF said armored forces also ordered a helicopter gunship to attack a building in the Gaza Strip where a number of Hamas members had gathered.
The military released a series of clips showing forces operating in the Gaza Strip.
At the same time, Israeli warplanes bombed the northern Gaza Strip on Friday and Saturday night, hitting more than 150 underground tunnels and bunkers.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Saturday afternoon that the war had “entered a new phase” and highlighted increased activity by ground forces in the Gaza Strip.
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said in a video statement that Israel must carry out a major ground offensive in the Gaza Strip to defeat Hamas and return hostages held by the terror group
“Today we entered a new phase,” Halevi said, echoing Gallant. “Our forces are currently conducting ground operations in the Gaza Strip… designed to achieve all of the war’s objectives: the defeat of Hamas, security at the borders and maximum efforts to return all hostages to their homes.”
“The objectives of war require access from the ground. “There are no successes without risks, and there is no victory without paying prices,” he continued. “We have set ourselves clear goals, the road will be long… we will fight with determination and win.”
According to the IDF, among the Hamas men killed in attacks was the head of Hamas’ so-called air campaign, Issam Abu Rukbeh. A statement from the IDF and Shin Bet intelligence agency said Abu Rukbeh was responsible for managing the terror group’s drones, unmanned aerial vehicles, paragliders, air detection systems and air defense systems.
In this handout photo, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant (r) speaks with Shin Bet leader Ronen Bar on October 28, 2023, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. (Ariel Hermoni/Ministry of Defense)
The military said he played a role in planning and executing Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack, directing the terrorists who paraglided into southern Israel as well as drone strikes on IDF observation posts.
It also said Hamas Naval Forces Gaza City Brigade commander Rateb Abu Sahiban was killed in a nighttime airstrike.
The IDF said Abu Sahiban planned and commanded a sea-based Hamas infiltration attempt on October 24 that was foiled by Israeli naval forces.
The humanitarian situation
Also on Saturday, the army announced that it would allow significantly more humanitarian aid from Egypt into the southern Gaza Strip.
The IDF hopes the additional food, water and medical supplies will encourage more Palestinians to leave the northern part of the Gaza Strip toward the south.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called for a “pause in hostilities” to allow humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip after the coastal area came under intense bombardment overnight.
“Gaza is in complete blackout and isolation while heavy shelling continues,” Borrell said on social media. “Far too many civilians, including children, were killed. “This violates international humanitarian law,” he said, adding: “A pause in hostilities is urgently needed to allow humanitarian access.”
Destroyed buildings in Gaza City, Saturday, October 28, 2023. (AP Photo/Abed Khaled)
Palestinian reports from Gaza were scarce after internet and telephone services collapsed during the Israeli bombardment on Friday evening, leaving Gaza largely cut off from contact with the outside world.
Palestinian telecommunications provider Paltel said the bombing caused a “complete disruption” of internet, mobile and landline services. The cutoff meant that casualties from attacks and ground attack details could not be counted immediately. Some satellite phones continued to work.
In one of the few reports to emerge from Gaza on Saturday, a BBC reporter said there was “total chaos” in the Gaza Strip.
“There was a massive bombardment in the north of the Gaza Strip on a scale we have never experienced before,” wrote Rushdi Abualouf. “Here at the hospital, ambulance drivers told me that they could not communicate with anyone and so they were only driving in the direction of the explosions.”
“Hundreds of buildings and houses have been completely destroyed and thousands of other homes damaged,” Mahmoud Bassal, a spokesman for the Hamas-run Gaza Civil Defense, told AFP, saying the intense bombardment had “changed the landscape” in the northern Gaza Strip.
A still image from a video released by the IDF shows Israeli tanks in the Gaza Strip on October 28, 2023. (Screenshot: IDF)
Witnesses said most of the bombings were concentrated in the area around two hospitals – Al-Shifa and the so-called Indonesian Hospital – in the Jabaliya district of northern Gaza.
The attacks left large craters in the streets and destroyed many buildings in the area.
The Israeli military announced Friday evening that Hamas was using Shifa Hospital in Gaza City as its main base of operations, providing footage and intercepted audio recordings as evidence of the terrorist organization’s activities.
The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said on Saturday that over 7,700 people had been killed in the war, including many children. The figures released by the terror group cannot be independently verified and are believed to include its own terrorists and gunmen killed in Israel and the Gaza Strip, and that the victims are, Israel says, hundreds of stray Palestinian rockets , who have ended up in the Gaza Strip since the war began. Israel says it killed 1,500 Hamas terrorists in Israel on and after October 7.