Israel launched its war against Hamas after its October 7 attack
Israel on Wednesday said it was "moving ahead" with its planned operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah to target Hamas, drawing a stern warning from neighbour Egypt.
Here Are 10 Points On Israel-Hamas War
- A spokesperson for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government said that Israel was "moving ahead" with a ground operation in Rafah. The defence official, however, gave no timeline.
- The official said Israel's Defence Ministry had bought 40,000 tents, each with the capacity for 10 to 12 people, to house Palestinians relocated from Rafah in advance of an assault.
- Netanyahu has repeatedly said that Israel will press ahead with the assault on Rafah, the last major population centre in Gaza that Israeli ground troops have yet to enter.
- Israel, which launched its war against Hamas after its October 7 attacks on Israeli towns, says Rafah is home to four Hamas combat battalions reinforced by thousands of retreating fighters.
- Israel, however, drew a warning from Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi, who said that any military operations in Rafah would have "catastrophic consequences" on the humanitarian situation in the sector and on regional peace and security.
- Rafah abuts the Egyptian border and is sheltering more than a million Palestinians who fled after the Israel-Hamas broke out more than six months ago.
- Israel's closest ally, the US, has called on it to set aside plans for an assault on Rafah and says that it can combat Hamas fighters there by other means.
- Israel has withdrawn most of its ground troops from southern Gaza but has kept up air strikes and conducted raids into areas its troops abandoned.
- Efforts by the US, Egypt and Qatar to broker an extended ceasefire in time to head off an assault on Rafah have so far failed.
- Gaza officials say that more than 34,000 people have been killed in Israel's military campaign, with thousands more bodies feared buried under rubble.
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