Defense Minister: We are at crucial moments. It’s us or them
Israel Defense Forces said on Thursday that its airstrikes in the Gaza Strip during the day had killed five senior commanders of the Hamas terror group, while Defense Minister Yoav Gallant reiterated that a ground operation was imminent and vowed to win the war in the next 75 Years largely depend on it.
The military also denied reports that Israel would agree to supply fuel to the besieged Palestinian enclave in return for the release of many hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The IDF has been preparing for several weeks for a large-scale attack to eradicate the terrorist group ruling the Gaza Strip following its murderous attack in southern Israel. It has bombed the Gaza Strip on an unprecedented scale to eliminate potential threats to ground forces when the order finally comes.
The military said the deputy head of Hamas’ intelligence directorate, Shadi Barud, was killed in an airstrike on Thursday. The IDF accused Barud of plotting the October 7 massacre along with Gaza’s Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar. Barud previously served as a battalion commander in the Khan Younis region and held other roles in the terror group’s intelligence directorate and “was responsible for planning numerous terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians,” the IDF said.
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Another attack killed Hassan al-Abdullah, the leader of Hamas’s North Khan Younis missile complex. The army said fighter jets attacked and killed several more Hamas members and destroyed several of the terror group’s sites throughout the day.
And in the evening, the military said it had killed three senior commanders of Hamas’s Daraj Tuffah battalion: battalion commander Rifaat Abbas; the deputy commander, Ibrahim Jadba; and a combat support commander, Tarek Maarouf. According to the IDF, the Daraj Tuffah Battalion is part of Hamas’s Gaza City Brigade, which is “considered the most significant brigade of the Hamas terrorist organization.”
“The battalion’s agents played a significant role in the invasion and murderous attack against Israel on October 7,” the IDF added.
The army released several videos showing the airstrikes that killed senior Hamas members.
Israel says its war against Hamas is aimed at destroying the Iran-backed terror group’s infrastructure and has vowed to dismantle the organization after the Oct. 7 massacres while minimizing damage to civilians in the Gaza Strip hold. The IDF has called on Palestinians to evacuate south from the northern Gaza Strip as attacks have increased in the Gaza City area.
Led by Hamas and along with other terrorist groups, around 2,500 terrorists stormed across the border into Israel from the Gaza Strip by land, air and sea, killing around 1,400 people and capturing at least 228 hostages of all ages under the cover of thousands of rockets were fired at Israeli cities.
In a prime-time televised address Thursday evening, Defense Secretary Gallant pledged to make “every effort” to return the hostages held by Hamas, saying, “We are at crucial moments.” This is a war for our home and we will win him. It’s either us or them.”
“Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza is being carried out by air, land and sea. It hits bunkers, tunnels, communications facilities, terrorists and their commanders,” he continued. “War is precise, deadly and powerful. It is our duty to win this war. This is the unwritten contract between the security company and the citizens. As Secretary of Defense, it is my duty to ensure that we win the fight and that citizens here can live in peace and tranquility.”
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant holds a press conference on October 26, 2023. (GPO/Screenshot)
Gallant reiterated that the planned ground offensive would take place soon. “There will also be further phases of war, we are creating the conditions for them and we will carry them out. “I am determined…to ensure that the State of Israel triumphs over this harsh and evil enemy – this epitome of evil.”
“In Israel’s 75 years of existence, nothing like this has ever happened,” he continued, noting the scale of the carnage and destruction as well as the number of Israelis kidnapped. “What will happen in the next 75 years depends largely on the successes in this struggle.”
According to Israeli Air Force sources, more than 10,000 sites belonging to Hamas and other terrorist groups have been attacked since the start of the war.
According to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza, more than 7,000 people, including many children, were killed in the attacks. 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.
The death toll on both sides is expected to rise significantly once Israel launches its ground offensive and begins entering cities. Troops are expected to contend with the network of tunnels, booby traps and bombs dug by terrorist groups as they fight through harsh urban environments.
The IDF carried out a limited ground assault into the Gaza Strip in the early hours of Thursday, sending infantry troops and tanks in a “targeted attack” up to a kilometer into the northern part of the Gaza Strip before the planned major offensive began.
According to the IDF, the raid – led by the Givati Infantry Brigade and the 162nd Armored Division – was part of the border area’s preparation for the “next phases of the war.” The troops attacked “numerous” terrorists, infrastructure and anti-tank missile launch sites and “operated to prepare the battlefield,” the Army said.
The soldiers returned to Israeli territory after the hours-long raid, the IDF added.
IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said Thursday evening that the army would continue similar limited ground attacks in Gaza, saying they would be carried out “again this evening and will continue even more vigorously in the coming days.”
He said the IDF was still carrying out “massive attacks” on the Gaza Strip “from the air and sea,” focusing on killing senior Hamas members and those involved in the Oct. 7 attack.
Thursday saw multiple volleys of rockets targeting central Israel, including the cities of Tel Aviv, Rishon Lezion, Bat Yam, Givatayim, Ramat Gan, Holon and others, as well as barrage attacks on the southern cities of Ashdod, Ashkelon and Netivot, as well as major ones Parts of Israel evacuated communities on the Gaza border.
Many of the projectiles were intercepted or fell in uninhabited areas, but one damaged a building in downtown Petah Tikva and started a fire in an eighth-floor apartment, prompting all 36 families living in the building to temporarily evacuate as Officials removed the rocket from the building, which is believed to have not fully exploded. A woman who lived in the damaged apartment had left with her daughter a few minutes before the impact.
Terrorists from the Gaza Strip have fired thousands of rockets into Israel since October 7, killing and injuring scores of people.
IDF Chief of General Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said on Tuesday that the full ground offensive in Gaza had been delayed by “tactical and even strategic considerations.”
On Wednesday, The New York Times reported that Israel had agreed to a request from the United States to temporarily postpone its planned ground attack in the Gaza Strip to give Washington more time to deploy additional air defense systems to protect its troops in the region.
The US was also reportedly concerned that Israel lacks achievable military targets for its operations in Gaza, leading to fears that the IDF was not yet ready for a ground attack.
A convoy of trucks carrying humanitarian aid enters the Gaza Strip from Egypt via the Rafah border crossing on October 21, 2023. (Eyad Baba/AFP)
The campaign is also understood to have been postponed to allow for extensive internationally mediated negotiations with Hamas over the possible release of hundreds of Israeli and foreign hostages it is holding. Talks led to four prisoners being released – mother and daughter Judith and Natalie Ra’anan on Friday evening and elderly women Yocheved Lifshitz and Nurit Cooper on Monday evening.
The negotiations have also resulted in a trickle of humanitarian aid reaching the Gaza Strip for besieged and devastated civilians. According to Rafah crossing officials and the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, 12 aid trucks carrying food, water and medicine entered the Gaza Strip on Thursday, bringing the total number of trucks entering the Gaza Strip in recent days to 74.
Hebrew media reports on Thursday evening suggested that Israel is considering allowing the import of fuel into the Gaza Strip via Egypt as part of a deal that included the release of scores of Hamas prisoners. But Hagari, the IDF spokesman, said: “At this point, the instruction from the political leadership is that no fuel enters. If there is a change, we will inform the public.”
Hagari added that much of Hamas’s ability to operate “depends on fuel,” repeating the claim that the terror group steals and stores fuel that could be delivered to hospitals.
An image shared by the IDF showing twelve oil tanks where Hamas is said to be storing its reserves as the Gaza Strip runs out of fuel during the ongoing war with Israel, October 24, 2023. (IDF Arabic spokesperson on X)
Hamas on Thursday made an unconfirmed claim that “nearly 50” Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip had been killed by Israeli airstrikes. There has been no independent verification and Israel has not responded to such claims in the past. The terrorist group often fabricates such statements and wages psychological warfare against the hostages’ families and the general population.
“Izz ad-Din Al-Qassam Brigades estimates that the number of Zionist prisoners killed in the Gaza Strip as a result of Zionist attacks and massacres has reached almost 50,” the group said in a statement on its Telegram channel.
Times of Israel staff and agencies contributed to this report.