Exclusive photos have been released showing the Israeli army marching through the northern Gaza Strip as its ground invasion continues after weeks of shelling.
Troops from the 14th Brigade of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are seen fighting with Hamas terrorists in the Palestinian territory and dragging heavily armed infantry through the destroyed remains of large parts of the Gaza Strip.
They were joined by tanks and combat engineers searching for the terrorist organization’s infrastructure, including ammunition and rocket launch pits.
Dramatic images show the IDF’s custom-built Merkava tanks spewing gas as troops trek through the haze that remains on the front lines nearly a month after the conflict began.
The images were taken by photographer Ziv Koren, who is part of the unit and weeks earlier documented the aftermath of the horrific Hamas massacres in southern Israel on October 7th.
Israeli soldiers walk along the front line in the Gaza Strip on Monday as a tank spews gas in the background
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) gather in a red-flag trench on Monday as they advance into Palestinian territory
Infantry kneel on a dirt road in northern Gaza on Monday as preparations continue for an attack on Gaza City
Two IDF Merkava tanks move across a field in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday after Israel began ground operations
Soldiers from the IDF’s 14th Brigade use binoculars to peer into the Gaza Strip from a vantage point on Monday
In recent days, Israel has stepped up its operations in the region and sought to expand the fight against Hamas after Israel killed more than 1,400 innocent civilians in southern Israel in a series of raids on October 7.
In the weeks that followed, Israel bombarded the Gaza Strip with airstrikes, killing more than 10,000 civilians, including more than 4,000 children, according to the territory’s health ministry.
Large parts of the northern Gaza Strip have been reduced to rubble in preparation for a ground assault, with IDF troops surrounding Gaza City in recent days.
Jewish state forces are expected to advance into the densely populated urban area in the coming days to dislodge Hamas and force it out of the area.
Casualties are expected to mount in urban conflicts, with militants likely to fight street by street in areas where they have had years to prepare and launch ambushes from the vast network of tunnels they have built beneath the city.
“We are closing in on them,” said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli military spokesman. “We have completed our encirclement and separated the Hamas strongholds in the north from the south.”
According to the Israeli press, troops are now expected to enter Gaza City within 48 hours – an operation that would mark a new chapter in the conflict that began nearly a month ago when Hamas gunmen stormed Israel and slaughtered 1,400 people .
As IDF troops prepared to enter Gaza City, they took control of a Hamas outpost that contained training grounds, entrances to a network of underground tunnels and an observation post, a spokesman said.
Israel has told residents living in Gaza City that they still have the option of fleeing south via an evacuation route, but many are fearful of doing so due to the volume of IDF troops on that route.
Around 70 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents have fled their homes since the conflict began, with many now sleeping in tents, refugee camps or on the side of the road.
Soldiers walk through smoke blowing across the front line in northern Gaza on Monday
A special IDF vehicle used to clear areas with potential mines and explosives enters the Gaza Strip
The view from an Israeli tank looking over the smoky battlefield outside Gaza City on Monday
The view from a gunner’s position of a tank that appears to be moving through the wall between Israel and Gaza
Photographer Ziv Koren was accepted into the 14th Brigade after documenting the aftermath of Hamas’ October 7 terrorist attacks. Pictured: An Israeli flag in front of the charred remains of a house on Kibbutz Be’eri
An IDF soldier moves through the Kfar Aza kibbutz after it was attacked by Hamas on October 7
An Israeli soldier cries as he sees a family table filled with food following the Hamas terror attacks in Kfar Aza
This morning communications were gradually restored across the area after being disrupted for the third time since the start of the war.
The developments came as an Israeli attack hit the roof of Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, killing a number of displaced people taking shelter on the top floor and destroying solar panels, the director general of all Gaza hospitals said.
The panels have helped maintain power to the facility, which has been limited to using a generator due to fuel shortages.
More than 140 Palestinians have been killed in violence and Israeli raids in the occupied West Bank.
More than 1,400 people in Israel were killed, most of them in the Oct. 7 Hamas attack that sparked the fighting, and 242 hostages were brought from Israel to Gaza by the militant group.
About 1,100 people have left the Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing since Wednesday, apparently as part of an agreement between the United States, Egypt, Israel and Qatar, which is brokering with Hamas.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today called on the world to support the fight against Hamas, claiming his country is engaged in a “global battle” against an Iran-led “axis of terror.”
The 74-year-old world leader said Israel’s deadliest conflict with Hamas in decades was a “larger battle between civilization and barbarism” led by Iran and backed by Hezbollah, Hamas and Houthi rebels.
“They want to return the Middle East and the world to a dark age. They are trying to torpedo and derail any progress towards peace and the progress and promise of peace that we had in our burgeoning treaties with our Arab neighbors,” he claimed in a press conference today.
He warned that if the Middle East “falls into the hands of enemy nations,” “Europe will be next and no one will be safe.”
“This is not a local battle. This is a global fight. The greatest need is to defeat this axis. We are now waging this fight against Hamas in Gaza.
“There is no substitute for victory.” We will defeat and destroy Hamas. We will provide a real future for the people of Gaza and the entire people of the Middle East. A future full of promise and hope.
“But that requires a victory.” We have the will and the power to do it. We will win, and we believe that all civilized powers should support us in this endeavor, for this battle is your battle and our victory is your victory.
A look at military action in a location referred to as Gaza amid the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas in this screenshot from a handout video released on November 6, 2023
A Palestinian reacts as others check the rubble of a building in Khan Yunis on November 6
This handout image released by the Israeli army on November 5, 2023 shows Israeli tanks and soldiers stationed at a location in the northern Gaza Strip as fighting continues between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement
This image, taken on November 5, 2023, from a position near Sderot on Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip, shows flares dropped by Israeli forces over the Palestinian enclave during fighting between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement last for
On November 5, 2023, Israeli forces will be stationed on the Gaza border in southern Israel
At a civilian facility, the Sheikh Hamad, known as the “Qatar Hospital,” Hagari showed photographic evidence of tunnel entrances next to the building discovered by Israeli troops
Israeli soldiers take part in a military operation in a place called Gaza, amid the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas
Palestinian children sit in front of the rubble of a destroyed building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on November 6, 2023
A Palestinian man carries the body of a child killed in an Israeli bombing as he leaves Shuhada Al-Aqsa Hospital
Relatives of Palestinians who died in the Israeli airstrikes gather around the bodies recovered from the mortuary of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital before the mourning ceremony in Deir Al-Balah, Gaza, November 6, 2023
Critics say Israel’s attacks on Gaza are often disproportionate given the large number of civilians killed – but IDF spokesman Jonathan Conricus strongly justified the brutal attack on the Gaza Strip.
“We will take the fight to Hamas, wherever it is – underground, above ground.” “We will be able to dismantle Hamas, one fortress at a time, one battalion at a time, until we have achieved the ultimate goal, which is the liberation of the Gaza Strip – the entire Gaza Strip – from Hamas,” he said.
The north of the Gaza Strip was hit by incessant Israeli airstrikes overnight Sunday into Monday morning, as the IDF tries to soften Hamas strongholds in Gaza City before its soldiers are forced to move on foot through the dangerous streets.
Israel has accused Hamas of war crimes and presented new evidence it says shows the terror group is using hospitals in the Gaza Strip as military bases while preventing civilians from escaping.
At the Sheikh Hamad Hospital, known as the “Qatar Hospital,” Rear Admiral Hagari said he showed photographic evidence of tunnel entrances along the building discovered by Israeli troops.
Hagari said Hamas was operating from the hospital because it knew the IDF could not launch an airstrike on them without causing collateral damage.
“Without human shields, Hamas is weak,” he said.
On the ground, Israeli forces in Gaza have reported finding caches of weapons, including at times explosives, suicide drones and rockets.
The Israeli military says 29 of its soldiers have died in the ground operation so far.
Large residential areas in the north of the Gaza Strip were razed to the ground by air strikes.
The U.N. humanitarian affairs office says more than half of the remaining residents, estimated at around 300,000, are seeking refuge in U.N.-run facilities.
According to the United Nations, 88 Palestinian refugee agency staff were killed, “the highest death toll the United Nations has ever recorded in a single conflict.”
Around 1.5 million people in Gaza, or 70 percent of the population, are believed to have fled their homes.
Food, water and the fuel needed for the generators that power hospitals are almost empty because no fuel has been delivered for almost a month, the United Nations’ Palestinian refugee agency said.
Ongoing Palestinian rocket fire has also forced tens of thousands of people in Israel to flee their homes.