Key Points
- Israel has hammered the Gaza Strip with its fiercest air strikes in decades.
- This is despite a threat from Hamas to kill hostages every time Israel strikes.
- US President Joe Biden has denounced Hamas and stressed US support for Israel.
Israel has hammered the Gaza Strip with its fiercest air strikes in decades, razing entire districts despite a threat from Hamas militants to execute a captive every time Israel bombed a Palestinian home without warning.
Israel has vowed to take “mighty revenge,” calling up hundreds of thousands of reservists and placing Gaza – a crowded home to 2.3 million people – under total siege, four days after Hamas gunmen rampaged through towns in a bloody weekend assault.
US President Joe Biden has denounced Hamas and stressed US support for Israel following Hamas attacks he described as “sheer evil”.
The president also voiced concern for Americans being held hostage by Hamas.
“There are moments in this life and I mean this literally when the pure unadulterated evil is unleashed on this world. The people of Israel lived through one such moment this weekend,” Biden said.
“This is an act of sheer evil.”
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, speaking to soldiers near the Gaza fence, said Israel’s attacks would only intensify.
President Joe Biden (centre) has voiced concern for Americans being held hostage by Hamas. Source: AP / Evan Vucci
“Hamas wanted a change and it will get one. What was in Gaza will no longer be.”
In Israel bodies were being collected from the kibbutz of Kfar Aza, an Israeli farming community of about 750 people, which was terrorised by Hamas in what witnesses described as a “massacre”.
“It’s not a war, it’s not a battlefield. It’s a massacre,” Veruv said. Some victims were decapitated, he added. “I’ve never seen anything like this, and I’ve served for 40 years.”
The significant escalation is the latest in a long-standing conflict between Hamas and Israel.
Hamas, in its entirety, is designated as a terrorist organisation by countries including Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Some countries list only its military wing as a terrorist group.
The UN though did not condemn Hamas in its entirety as a terrorist organisation, due to insufficient support from member states to do so during a 2018 vote.
Israel’s next move could be a ground offensive into the Gaza Strip.
The violence, which has claimed more than 1,800 lives, has prompted international declarations of support and public demonstrations for both Israelis and Palestinians and appeals for an end to the fighting and protection of civilians.
Egypt alarmed as airstrikes close crossing
Egypt is moving to prevent a mass exodus from the Gaza Strip into its Sinai Peninsula, as Israeli airstrikes halted crossings at the main exit point from the Palestinian enclave, Gaza officials and Egyptian security sources said.
Israel’s assault on Gaza has caused alarm in Egypt, which has urged Israel to provide safe passage for civilians from the enclave rather than encouraging them to flee southwest towards Sinai, two Egyptian security sources said.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said on Tuesday that the escalation in Gaza was “highly dangerous” and that Egypt was pursuing a negotiated solution to the violence with regional and international partners.
Rafah is the sole possible crossing point into Sinai for Gazans’s 2.3 million residents. The rest of the densely populated strip is surrounded by the sea, and by Israel, which has announced a total siege of Gaza and could launch a ground offensive.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has labelled the situation in Gaza as ‘highly dangerous’. Source: EPA / Mikhail Tereschenko/Tass Host Photo Agency
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Monday said the country would escalate measures against the Gaza Strip to a “total blockade” including a ban on admitting food and fuel.
UN Human Rights chief Volker Turk said Israel’s “imposition of sieges that endanger the lives of civilians by depriving them of goods essential for their survival is prohibited under international humanitarian law.”
Israel’s embassy in the United States said the death toll from the Hamas attack had surpassed 1,000, with thousands injured and dozens held captive.
Among the Israeli dead were 260 mostly young people gunned down at a desert music festival, where some of the hostages were abducted.
Gaza’s health ministry said Israel’s retaliatory air strikes since Saturday’s attacks had killed at least 830 people and wounded 4,250.
Apartment blocks, a mosque and hospitals were among the sites attacked, and the strikes destroyed some roads and houses, according to media reports and eyewitnesses.
The United Nations said more than 180,000 Gazans had been made homeless, many huddling on streets or in schools.
The strikes intensified on Tuesday night, shaking the ground and sending more columns of smoke and flames into the sky.
UN aid chief calls for immediate release of hostages
The head of the United Nations humanitarian relief agency on Tuesday called for the immediate release of hostages on both sides.
“My message to all sides is unequivocal: The laws of war must be upheld,” UN aid chief Martin Griffiths said in a statement.
“Those held captive must be treated humanely. Hostages must be released without delay.
Civilians must be allowed to leave for safer areas. And humanitarian relief and vital services and supplies to Gaza must not be blocked.”
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, told CNN the number of hostages in Gaza was between 100 and 150.
The Palestinian foreign ministry said Israeli strikes had since Saturday destroyed more than 22,600 residential units and 10 health facilities and damaged 48 schools.
The British, French, German, Italian and US governments issued a joint statement recognising the “legitimate aspirations” of the Palestinian people, and supporting equal measures of justice and freedom for Israelis and Palestinians alike. They also said they would remain “united and coordinated” to ensure Israel can defend itself.
Qatari mediators held urgent calls to try to negotiate freedom for Israeli women and children seized by Hamas in exchange for the release of 36 Palestinian women and children from Israeli prisons.
