- LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
- Blinken says the Rafah border crossing will reopen to allow humanitarian assistance
- Fuel reserves in all Gaza hospitals are expected to last only about 24 hours, the UN said
- It is estimated that more than 1,000 people are missing under the rubble in the Gaza Strip
- According to Israel, 600,000 Palestinians have left the north of the Gaza Strip
CAIRO/WASHINGTON/GAZA, Oct 16 (Portal) – An Egyptian-controlled border crossing into Gaza is expected to reopen amid diplomatic efforts to bring aid into the Hamas-controlled strip, which has been closed since The group’s rampage that killed 1,300 people was subjected to heavy Israeli bombing on October 7.
Shocked by the attack on towns and villages, Israel is carrying out the heaviest bombardment Gaza has ever seen, has imposed a strict blockade and is preparing a ground invasion.
Hundreds of tons of aid from several countries have been held in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula for days until an agreement is reached on its safe delivery to Gaza and the evacuation of some foreign passport holders through the Rafah border crossing.
“Rafah will reopen. We are setting up a mechanism with the United Nations, with Egypt, with Israel and others to get the aid and get it to the people who need it,” said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken after a meeting with the Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Sunday.
Blinken did not give a specific date for the border crossing to reopen. Veteran U.S. diplomat David Satterfield, who was named special envoy for humanitarian issues in the Middle East on Sunday, will arrive in Egypt on Monday to work out the details, Blinken said.
NBC News reported, citing a Palestinian official, that the Rafah crossing would open at 9 a.m. Monday. Citing a security source, ABC News reported that the border crossing would be open for a few hours on Monday, without providing details. Portal could not immediately confirm either report.
Israel has urged exhausted Gazans to evacuate south, as hundreds of thousands have already done in the besieged enclave, home to more than two million people. Hamas, which rules Gaza, has told people to ignore Israel’s message.
Palestinians in Gaza said Israel’s bombing raids overnight were the heaviest since it launched its retaliatory attacks last week. The bombardment was particularly heavy in Gaza City, with airstrikes hitting the area around two of the city’s main hospitals, it said.
Fuel reserves in all Gaza hospitals are expected to last only about 24 hours, putting thousands of patients at risk, the United Nations Humanitarian Office (OCHA) said on Monday.
According to the authorities in Gaza, at least 2,670 people have been killed, a quarter of them children, and almost 10,000 have been injured as a result of Israeli retaliatory strikes. Another 1,000 people were missing and were probably lying under rubble.
U.S. officials say they are mobilizing to help ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and are anticipating a brutal ground offensive.
President Joe Biden has called on Israel to abide by martial law in its response to Hamas attacks, saying in a social media post on Sunday that “the overwhelming majority of Palestinians have nothing to do with Hamas’ horrific attacks had and is suffering from it.” a result of them.
In a CBS 60 Minutes interview broadcast Sunday, Biden said Israel must eliminate Hamas but warned that it would be a mistake for Israel to occupy Gaza.
Washington is also focused on preventing the conflict from spilling over, particularly given escalating clashes with Lebanon on the border with Israel.
Blinken said the leaders of Arab states he visited across the region in recent days were determined to stop the spread of war.
“They’re using their own influence, their own relationships to make sure that doesn’t happen,” said Blinken, who was due to return to Israel on Monday and is also seeking the release of 155 hostages, including Americans, Israel says were held by brought back to Gaza by Hamas.
Iran, which supports both Hamas and Hezbollah, warned Israel of escalation if it continued to attack Palestinians.
“If the Zionist aggression does not stop, all parties in the region will withdraw,” Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said, adding that Tehran could not simply remain an observer.
GROUND OFFENSIVE EXPECTED
As a sign of unity, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened Israel’s expanded emergency cabinet on Sunday, which also includes former opposition MPs. “Hamas thought we would be destroyed. We are the ones who will destroy Hamas,” he said.
The Israeli military, which has deployed tanks on the Gaza border in preparation for a ground offensive, says it is targeting Hamas and its infrastructure in response.
Israeli aircraft struck about 250 military targets on Sunday, killing the commander of the southern Hamas district, the military said.
Israeli military chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi told soldiers near the Gaza border that they would enter Gaza to eradicate Hamas, targeting “every location, every commander, every operator.”
“You are about to do something big and important that must significantly change the situation for a long time,” Halevi said.
HUMANITARIAN CRISIS
An Israeli blockade has prevented the entry of fuel, food and water into the Gaza Strip, despite Netanyahu’s agreement with Biden to restore water supplies to parts of the southern Gaza Strip, a minister said on Sunday.
The Israeli military said about 600,000 Gazans had left the northern half of the territory, which includes the more than one million residents of Gaza City.
Some Palestinians who went south said they would go back north because they were attacked everywhere.
Palestinian media reported that Israeli aircraft bombed areas around the Al-Quds Hospital in Gaza City early Monday and ambulances at the facility were unable to move due to the attacks.
According to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, Israel ordered the hospital to evacuate on Saturday, saying it could not move sick and wounded people from the facility.
The U.N. aid effort in Gaza “is on the verge of collapse,” said Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner general of the U.N. agency for the Palestinians UNRWA.
“The number of people seeking shelter in our schools and other UNRWA facilities in the south is absolutely overwhelming and we no longer have the capacity to deal with them,” he said.
Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk, Hatem Maher, Ahmed Tolba and Omar Abdel-Razek in Cairo, Nandita Bose, Rami Ayyub and Katharine Jackson in Washington, Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza, Ari Rabinovitch, Dan Williams, Henriette Chacar, Dedi Hayun, Maayan Lubell , Emily Rose, James Mackenzie and John Davison in Jerusalem, Parisa Hafezi in Dubai, Michelle Nichols at the United Nations; Writing by Simon Lewis; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Stephen Coates
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