DUBAI: As Israel’s forces advanced farther into the north and south corners of the beleaguered enclave in preparation for a new assault, the health ministry said that the death toll from Israel’s military attack on Gaza since October 7 has surpassed 35,000.
The Gaza Health Ministry estimated the dead toll at 35,091 in a statement on Monday, adding that 57 people had died in the previous day.
On Monday, Israeli forces advanced well into the ruins of Gaza’s northern border in an attempt to retake a region where they said they had destroyed Hamas months before. Meanwhile, troops and tanks advanced into Rafah from the south over a highway.
Humanitarian organizations claim that the closure of a major aid crossing point in Rafah, which borders Egypt, as a result of Israeli activities is exacerbating the already severe situation.
Palestinians are still leaving Jabalia and other regions while the US envoy to Israel calls the size of the Rafah incursion “acceptable.”
Gaza’s health authority made a plea to the international community on Monday to restore access across the southern border in order to permit the entry of medical supplies and aid.
It stated, “The sick and injured suffer a slow death because they cannot travel and there is no treatment or supplies.”
Residents of the Jabalia camp in northern Gaza fled with their possessions in bags along streets covered with debris.
According to them, clusters of buildings were demolished by airstrikes and tank shells that landed in the center of the camp. Twenty Palestinians murdered in midnight airstrikes have their remains recovered, according to health officials.
“We’re not sure where to go. We’ve been relocated from one location to another. We’re sprinting through the streets. I was able to witness it myself. I noticed the bulldozer and the tank. One woman, who wished to remain anonymous, stated, “It’s on that street.”
“Struggle to survive”
Speaking on Monday at a Memorial Day event in Jerusalem honoring Israel’s dead soldiers, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that the fight against Hamas is an effort to preserve Israel’s “existence, liberty, security, and prosperity.”
Israel increased ground and air strikes on the eastern parts of Rafah, killing civilians in an airstrike on a house.
Hundreds of thousands of people fled towards safety when Israel ordered last week for inhabitants to leave the east of Rafah and in recent days expanded the order to central neighborhoods.
Residents reported that tanks had closed off the main Salahuddin Road, which split the eastern part of the city from the central region, and that Israeli air and ground shelling was getting worse.
The soldiers are currently in the southeast, assembling close to the populated region, after the tanks tore up the Salahuddin Road east of the city. The noises of bombs never stopped, and the situation is terrible,” stated Bassam, 57, of Rafah’s Shaboura neighborhood.
Since the Israeli military issued its initial order to evacuate the southern city one week ago, UNRWA, the primary United Nations relief organization in Gaza, estimated that over 360,000 people had left the area. According to medical staff at Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, an airstrike on a residence claimed the lives of five persons.
“Permissible encroachment”
For the first time since the start of the conflict, the US has stopped supplying some weapons to Israel, citing the need for Israel to have a plan in place before attacking Rafah that it has not yet seen.
According to the Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s office, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was briefed on the “precise operation” in the Rafah region on Monday.
The US ambassador to Israel, Jack Lew, gave a hint on Sunday that Washington still views the Rafah incursion as reasonable.
However, Hamas said that its members were fighting Israeli forces with guns in a roadway east of Rafah and east of Jabalia.
The Rafah crossing, which Israel took last week, was the target of mortar strikes by Hamas, according to them.
