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Netanyahu calls on Hamas to surrender
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Palestinian Detainees Denounce Abuses
By Bassam Masoud and Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA/CAIRO, Dec 10 (Reuters) – Israeli tanks slammed into the center of Khan Younis on Sunday in a new primary offensive in the southern Gaza Strip city, as the Hamas-led Gaza government said around 18,000 Palestinians had been killed in the war.
Israeli leaders said dozens of Hamas fighters had surrendered, encouraging more to do so; The Palestinian militant organization denied the claim, calling it “false and baseless. “
Residents of Khan Younis said tanks had reached the main north-south highway through the city after heavy fighting that night slowed the Israeli advance from the east. Fighter jets were bombing the western part of the assault.
The air rumbled with the constant thud of explosions, and thick plumes of white smoke rose over the densely populated city, filled with displaced people from the enclave.
U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who has unsuccessfully pushed for a ceasefire in Gaza, said the enclave was in collapse. “I expect public order to completely break down soon and an even worse situation could unfold including epidemic diseases and increased pressure for mass displacement into Egypt,” he said.
Earlier on Sunday, near a city-centre police station, the constant rattle of machinegun fire could be heard. Streets there were deserted as morning broke apart from an old woman and a girl riding on a donkey cart.
“It’s one of the most terrible nights, the resistance is very strong, we can hear gunshots and explosions that didn’t stop for hours,” a father of four displaced children from Gaza City and refugee in Khan Younis told Reuters. Be known for your concern about retaliation.
On the other side of the Gaza Strip, in areas in the north where Israel had said in the past that its forces had largely completed their task, citizens also described some of the heaviest fighting of the war so far.
“I dare say this is the most violent war we have heard of in weeks,” said Nasser, a 59-year-old father of seven, who fled to Jabaliya after his home in Beit Lahiya, another northern region, was destroyed. “We are not going to abandon Jabaliya no matter what. We will die here as martyrs or they will leave us alone. “
Israel vowed to eliminate Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, after militants breached the barrier on Oct. 7 and razed Israeli towns, shooting dead families in their homes, killing another 1,200 people and taking 240 hostages.
Gaza’s health government says around 18,000 people were killed and 49,500 wounded in the Israeli attacks, and thousands more went missing and are presumed to have died under the rubble. The report no longer includes figures for the northern areas of the enclave, where ambulance access is without ambulance access and where hospitals have stopped functioning.
WHO’S ALIVE?
On Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said dozens of Hamas fighters had left, calling it the beginning of the end for the organization. “Finished, now,” he told them in a televised statement.
Hamas denied that its fighters had surrendered and said it destroyed 180 Israeli army vehicles during the fighting, without providing evidence.
He said Israel would not be able to retrieve the remaining hostages by force, but only through negotiations.
Images that surfaced on social media on Friday showing Palestinians detained in Gaza kneeling on the ground have sparked widespread anger in Arab countries.
Palestinians from an organization of 10 other people released by the Israeli army in Gaza told Reuters they had been physically abused during their detention, adding that infantrymen beat them with shoes on the head and body. An Israeli military spokesman said it was investigating the allegation.
After weeks of concentrated fighting in the north, Israel launched its ground offensive in the south last week with a typhoon in Khan Younis. Now that fighting is raging across most of the Gaza Strip, foreign aid agencies say its 2. 3 million citizens have nowhere to hide. .
The World Health Organization has said that a “catastrophic” scenario would be virtually unlikely in Gaza, where medical needs are greater and the risk of disease is higher, while the fitness formula has been drastically reduced.
Next to a site in Khan Younis that had been destroyed by shelling overnight, relatives of the dead stood dazedly sifting through the rubble. They pulled out from under the masonry the body of a middle-aged man dressed in a yellow T-shirt. .
“We prayed the nighttime prayer and went to sleep, then woke up to find the house on top of us. ‘Who’s alive?!'” said Ahmed Abdel Wahab.
“Three floors above have collapsed and there are other people underneath,” he said. “My mom and dad, my sister and my brother, all my cousins. “
Khan Younis’ main hospital, Nasser Hospital, is overrun with dead and wounded. On Sunday, there was no space in the emergency department as others carried more injured people wrapped in blankets and mats. Mohamed Abu Shihab wept and vowed revenge for his son, who he said had been killed by an Israeli sniper.
The vast majority of Gazans have been forced to leave their homes, with many continually fleeing with only the belongings they can carry. Israel says it is doing all it can with civilians, but even its closest ally, the United States, says so. He has not kept his promises.
ESCALATION FEARS
Fighting between Israel and the Iranian-backed Lebanese Hezbollah movement, sparked by the standoff in Gaza, intensified on Sunday.
At an international conference in Doha, capital of Qatar which acted as the main mediator for a week-long truce that saw more than 100 hostages freed, Arab foreign ministers criticised the United States for vetoing a U.N. Security Council resolution on Friday that demanded a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.
Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani has said the war threatens to radicalize an entire generation across the Middle East. Jordan’s foreign minister said the Israeli crusade was aimed at expelling Palestinians from Gaza and met the legal definition of genocide, charges Israel called outrageous.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “will not give up” on his call for a ceasefire.
“I suggested to the Security Council that it press to avoid a humanitarian disaster and reiterated my call for a humanitarian ceasefire to be declared,” Guterres said. “Unfortunately, the Security Council has not done so, but that does not make it any less necessary. ” “.
(Reporting by Bassam Masoud and Mohammed Salem in Gaza, Nidal al-Mughrabi in Cairo, Dan Williams, Ari Rabinovitch, Emily Rose and Henriette Chacar in Jerusalem Writing by Peter Graff and Angus McDowall; editing by Catherine Evans, Nick Macfie and Susan Fenton)