Israel and Hamas at war, day 216 | Strikes on Gaza, Washington threatens to curb military aid to Israel

(Rafah) The Israeli army bombarded the Gaza Strip on Thursday, as the United States threatened for the first time to stop arms transfers to Israel in the event of a major offensive in the crowded town of Rafah, near from the Egyptian border.

It is the strongest warning from the United States, a close ally of Israel and its main arms supplier, regarding the conduct of its war triggered on October 7 by a bloody attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on Israeli soil.

This warning comes in the middle of mediation in Cairo where indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas via Qatar, Egypt and the United States resumed on Wednesday to try to reach a compromise on a truce and avoid an assault in Rafah .

In the eyes of Hamas, Israeli operations in Rafah and its crossing point “aim to hinder the efforts of mediators,” said a member of the movement’s political bureau, Ezzat al-Rishq, on Thursday.

On the ground, an AFP team reported numerous artillery fire Thursday in Rafah, at the southern tip of the Gaza Strip. “Tanks and jets are firing,” said Tarek Bahloul, a resident on a deserted street in Rafah: “Every minute we hear a rocket and we don’t know where it will land.”

The Israeli army said it had struck Hamas military infrastructure, including sniper posts, in Zeitoun (center).

” Bloodbath ”

The Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is threatening to launch a ground offensive on Rafah, where according to Israel the last battalions of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas are hiding but where there are also 1.4 million Palestinians, the majority displaced by the war.

“Civilians were killed in Gaza because” of American bombs, President Joe Biden admitted in an interview with CNN, during which he for the first time set conditions for military aid to Israel, a close ally the United States.

“If they enter Rafah, I will not deliver to them the weapons that have always been used […] against cities,” declared Mr. Biden while the Israeli army said it was preparing a “limited” offensive in Rafah, causing the UN to fear a “bloodbath”.

Reacting to these comments, Israel’s ambassador to the UN told Israeli public radio on Thursday that the threat was “difficult to hear and very disappointing.”

For its part, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees indicated that around 80,000 people have fled Rafah since May 6, when Israel ordered Palestinians living in the east of the city to evacuate.

A senior US official confirmed on condition of anonymity the suspension last week of a transfer to Israel of “1,800 2,000-pound (907 kg) bombs and 1,700 500-pound (226 kg) bombs” used during the war. .

Earlier this week, the Israeli army took control of the border crossing with Egypt, cutting off the main gateway for humanitarian aid convoys to the besieged Palestinian territory.

The other crossing point near Rafah, Kerem Shalom on the Israeli side, closed on Sunday after shootings claimed by Hamas, was targeted on Wednesday by rocket fire shortly after its reopening, according to the army.

“Blind shelling”

Israeli soldiers continued their “targeted operations” on Wednesday on the Gaza side of the eastern Rafah crossing, based on reports of “terrorists operating in the area.”

“We are very afraid. The occupying army continues to indiscriminately fire shells on neighborhoods in eastern Rafah, in addition to an intensification of airstrikes,” city resident Mouhanad Ahmad told AFP. Qishta. “Even areas presented as safe by the Israeli army are bombarded,” he added.

The closure of crossing points and military operations in Rafah raise fears of a worsening of the humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian territory.

Hospitals in southern Gaza had only “three days of fuel” left on Wednesday, “which means they could soon stop functioning,” warned World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

This war broke out on October 7 when Hamas commandos infiltrated from Gaza carried out an attack against Israel, unprecedented in the country’s history, which left more than 1,170 dead, mostly civilians, according to an AFP report. established from official Israeli data.

More than 250 people have been kidnapped and 128 remain captive in Gaza, of whom 36 are believed to have died, according to the army. In response, the Israeli army launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip which has left 34,904 dead so far, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.

“Convergence” of views

Concerning the mediation talks in Cairo, the media Al-Qahera News, close to Egyptian intelligence, reported a “convergence” of views on certain points.

In Jerusalem, Benjamin Netanyahu met Wednesday with CIA Director William Burns to discuss a possible “pause” in military operations in the south of the Gaza Strip in exchange for the release of hostages, according to an Israeli official .

On Monday, a few hours before the deployment of Israeli troops in Rafah, Hamas gave the green light to a proposal presented by the mediators.

Israel responded that this proposal was “far from its demands” and repeated its opposition to a definitive ceasefire as long as Hamas, in power in Gaza since 2007 and which it considers a terrorist organization along with the States. -United and the European Union, would not be defeated.