/ world today news/ As Israeli troops in Gaza City search for evidence that Hamas is using hospitals as military centers, Israel’s chief of staff said the IDF will expand its operations to other Palestinian areas.
“We are close to dismantling the military system that was present in the northern Gaza Strip,” Lt. Gen. Herzi Ha-Levi told his troops during a tour of the Palestinian enclave.
Ha-Levi declined to elaborate on how the offensive might be expanded, but he spoke a day after parts of the southern Gaza Strip received evacuation notices. This raised fears that Israel might try to expand its ground offensive to the south.
Concerns grew when former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Euronews that Hamas has an underground command center in Khan Younis, a city in the southern Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Palestinians from Gaza City continue to move south. Israeli intelligence does not rule out the possibility of Hamas fighters trying to escape among the refugees. So, obviously, the filtering measures are coming to the Gaza Strip.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told NPR that there are three goals for the Gaza operation: to destroy Hamas, free Israeli hostages and give the Palestinian territories a different future.
WarZone: Israel Implements Strict Military Censorship
The prime minister has not said who he thinks should govern the territory of nearly 3 million people now devastated by six weeks of Israeli bombing. It is also unclear who will rebuild the destroyed Gaza Strip.
But Netanyahu still hasn’t even solved another task – the beheading of Hamas. The Israeli army tried to find a command bunker under the Dar al-Shifa hospital, the largest in the Gaza Strip.
“We see the presence of Hamas in all the hospitals, it’s a definite, obvious presence,” said Maj. Gen. Yaron Finkelman, commander of the IDF’s Southern Command.
While giving the WarZone interview, the major general posed in front of what Tzahal claimed was a tunnel shaft beneath the hospital. Finkelman said it contained assault rifles, suicide vests and even laptops containing recent information about the hostages.
WarZone emphasizes that it is impossible to verify the claims of Finkelman and other Israeli generals. Tzahal allows journalists to accompany the military only on one condition: the article or video is approved by the Israeli military censor.
Meanwhile, even Western publications have already caught Israel in propaganda lies. The BBC and Al Jazeera, for example, accused Israel of distorting information about military installations near Dar al-Shifa hospital.
Hamas continues to deny using the hospitals as military centers and claims Tzahal’s presence worsens the health situation in the devastated Gaza Strip.
“The intervention resulted in Gaza residents being denied access to medical care, triggering a humanitarian crisis with a fatal outcome for numerous patients and wounded,” Hamas said in a statement.
More than 20 patients have died at Dar al-Shifa hospital in the past two days, Al Jazeera reported, citing a spokesman for the hospital and the Palestinian Ministry of Health. The cause of death was a power outage caused by a lack of fuel.
Al-Jazeera: Tzahal will soon have to switch to ‘tunnel warfare’
There are two scenarios for the development of the situation, writes Al Jazeera. Hamas and the IDF have now reduced their military activity.
“There was some resistance to the initial Israeli offensive, but it was limited to small attacks that were aimed more at probing the enemy than actually stopping the army before it reached Gaza City,” Al Jazeera reported.
Palestinian paramilitaries are saving both weapons and personnel in anticipation of “tunnel warfare.” Sooner or later the Israeli army will have to move underground to find and destroy the entire tunnel system and command centers.
Hamas benefits from the prolongation of the conflict, writes Al-Jazeera. After all, dissatisfaction with the inability to achieve tangible results will further strengthen the voices of protest and rejection of the continuation of the Palestinian-Israeli war.
Tzahal realized the need to demonstrate some success for Israel and resorted to classic PR tricks. Israeli flags fly in Gaza.
And that day, the 35th Parachute Brigade presented brown berets to recruits right on the territory of the Gaza Strip. True, the Israelis did not accept such military pomp: what justifies holding the ceremony among destroyed and depopulated buildings?!
The Israeli military apparently hopes that the sentiment generated by the symbolic raising of Israeli flags in occupied territory will buy them some time before the public starts asking the unpopular question: “Are we really defeating Hamas?”
Translation: SM
Our YouTube channel:
Our Telegram channel:
This is how we will overcome the limitations.
Share on your profiles, with friends, in groups and on pages.
#Tzahal #preparing #invasion #southern #Gaza #Hamas #underground #war
