Geopolitics & Foreign Policy

Israeli forces storm Gaza’s Khan Younis, hospitals overrun.

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On Tuesday, Israeli soldiers began their assault on the largest city in the southern Gaza Strip. Hospitals were flooded with a large number of Palestinians who had been injured or killed during the assault.

Residents said that Israeli tanks had penetrated the eastern areas of Khan Younis for the first time, crossing from the Israeli border barrier and pushing westward. This was the most significant ground assault since a ceasefire broke last week.

Residents said that some individuals took up positions within the town of Bani Suhaila, located on the eastern outskirts of Khan Younis. Others, on the other hand, continued their journey and were stationed on the edge of a housing development known as Hamad City, which Qatar sponsors.

The Israelis, who had previously taken control of the northern half of Gaza a month ago before stopping for a week-long ceasefire, have announced that they are now expanding their ground assault to include the remaining portion of the enclave to achieve their goal of destroying the Hamas leaders who are in charge of it.

From now on, we will move on to the second step. Eylon Levy, a spokeswoman for the administration, told reporters during a briefing that a second stage would be challenging from a military standpoint.

In his statement, he stated that Israel was willing to consider “constructive feedback” about the reduction of harm to civilians, provided that the advice was in line with Israel’s objective of eliminating Hamas.

In the aftermath of what survivors described as a strike that struck a school that was being used as a refuge for the displaced, the injured arrived at the significant Nasser hospital in Khan Younis via ambulance, vehicle, flatbed truck, and donkey cart.

Within the confines of a ward, nearly every square inch of floor space was occupied with injured patients, with medical personnel rushing from one patient to the next while the patient’s family wept.

After carrying the little corpse of a deceased child who was dressed in a tracksuit, a physician placed the youngster in a corner with his arms spread out on the tile that was stained with blood. A boy and a girl who had been injured were lying on the floor next to him. They were surrounded by bandages and rubber gloves that had been abandoned, and their limbs were entangled with the stands that were holding the IV drips in their arms.

Even though they were still coated in dust from the fall of the house that had buried their family, two little girls were receiving medical attention.

One of them cried, “My parents are buried beneath the rubble.” “I want my mum, I want my mum, I want my family.”

On the outside, men were seen carrying bodies that were covered in white and bleeding shrouds in preparation for their funerals. As many as a dozen victims were found lying on the ground. A motorbike cart was used to remove five or six of them.

Aisha al-Raqb, who was 70 years old at the time, stated that her son Iyad was one among the deceased and extended a hand that was stained with blood.

“The blood in this is his.” The valuable blood that he has is this. I pray that Allah will have his soul forgiven. Oh, my sweetheart. “Oh God, oh God, I want to smell his scent, smell his scent, I want to smell his scent,” she said.

Ashra al-Qidra, a spokesman for the Gaza Health Ministry, stated that at least 43 bodies had already arrived at Nasser Hospital that morning. It is believed that dozens more bodies were suspected to be stuck beneath debris or in different areas that were unsuitable for ambulances to retrieve them.

“Hospitals in the southern Gaza Strip are totally collapsing, they cannot deal with the quantity and quality of injuries that arrive at the hospitals,” added the politician.

In the second phase of the Gaza war, which Israel initiated as a form of retaliation following an offensive on October 7 by Hamas gunmen who rampaged through cities, murdering 1,200 people and taking 240 captives according to Israel’s tally, Washington has urged on its close partner Israel to do more to lessen the suffering that does to civilians.

Eighty percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million citizens have been forced to flee their homes as a result of Israel’s unprecedented shelling of the Gaza Strip. Most of these people are converging on the southern neighborhoods, which are currently in the firing line.

There are around 15,800 persons who have been verified killed, according to Gaza health professionals who have been regarded as reputable by the United Nations. Additionally, many more people are missing and are believed to be buried under rubble.

Hamas fighters who operate among residents, especially from underground tunnels that can only be demolished with enormous bombs, are said to be responsible for the harm that has been caused to other civilians, according to Israel. Hamas refutes this assertion.

Israel has been releasing an internet map ever since the ceasefire broke down to assist Gazans in determining which areas of the enclave they should flee. This is the eastern section of Khan Younis, which was marked out on it on Monday. It is home to hundreds of thousands, most of whom fled on foot.

“What civilians should do to stay safe is listen to the instructions that are coming out from our Twitter accounts, from our website, and also to look at the leaflets that are landing in their areas,” Israeli military spokesperson Richard Hecht told reporters on Tuesday. “What they should do is listen to the instructions that are coming out.”

Those who live in Gaza claim that there is no safe place left to go because the remaining communities and shelters are already at capacity. In addition to the city of Rafah, which is located close to the Egyptian border south of Khan Younis, Israel has continued to bomb the locations where it is instructing Palestinians to go throughout this conflict.

“The situation is getting worse by the hour,” Richard Peeperkorn, a representative of the World Health Organization in Gaza, told reporters remotely over a video link from southern Gaza. “There’s intensified bombing going on all around, including here in the southern areas, Khan Younis and even in Rafah.”

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