RAFAH: Tanks marched through the heart of the southern Gaza city, which has served as a haven for those escaping Israeli shelling, on Tuesday, resulting in another strike on a camp for displaced Palestinians that claimed 21 lives.
The tank attack in Al Mawasi happened the day after a lethal attack on a different tent city in Rafah, which resulted in a fire that killed 45 people and destroyed many more. Following the strike on Sunday, there was outcry throughout the world, and Israeli authorities even expressed some regret for what they had done.
The attack on Tuesday, however, suggested that Israel had no plans to reverse direction or abide by an International Court of Justice decision to halt the offensive in Rafah.
According to a representative of the Gaza civil defense service, 21 individuals were slain in the most recent massacre in west Rafah during a “occupation strike targeting the tents of displaced people.”
According to locals and a Palestinian security source, Israeli tanks have already reached the center of the southern city of Rafah.
Medical officials in the Palestinian enclave reported that at least 12 of the deceased were female.
“Contrary to the reports from the last few hours, the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) did not strike in the Humanitarian Area in Al-Mawasi,” the Israeli military subsequently stated in a statement. The incident that happened in Al-Mawasi on Tuesday took place in an area that Israel has declared an enlarged humanitarian zone.
When it began its incursion in early May, Israel had advised Palestinian people in Rafah, including about a million who had been displaced by the nearly eight-month-old war, to leave the area.
Witnesses told Reuters that they saw tanks and armored cars with machineguns positioned close to the city’s famous Al-Awda mosque in central Rafah.
Without addressing rumors of their advances into the city center, the Israeli military stated that their forces were still in operation in the Rafah region.
The Israeli military appeared to have brought in remotely driven armored vehicles, according to witnesses in central Rafah, and there was no obvious indication of anyone inside or surrounding them. A spokesman for the Israeli military did not immediately respond.
One neighbor stated, “People are currently inside their homes because Israeli drones are shooting at anyone who moves.”
There is no safe area in Gaza, according to UN chief Antonio Guterres, who made this statement after witnessing the scorched corpses, charred horror, and children being taken to hospitals. This atrocity has to end.
Overnight on Monday and Tuesday, Gaza was pounded by airstrikes and artillery, affecting areas such as Tal al-Sultan, where a UNRWA facility is located and where the displacement camp caught fire.
A 30-year-old local named Faten Jouda explained the circumstances. Bombs were dropped at random from all sides. Once more, we observed everyone running,” she told AFP. “We are afraid for our lives, so we will also go now and head to Al-Mawasi.”
Thus far, at least 36,096 individuals have died in Gaza as a result of the Israeli offensive.
