UPDATED 1:15 P.M.
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel said its infantry and tanks had carried out raids inside the Gaza Strip on Friday, its first announcement of a shift from an air war to ground operations to root out Hamas fighters a week after their deadly rampage in southern Israel.
Some Gaza residents were abandoning homes on Friday to escape from the path of an Israeli onslaught, after Israel ordered more than a million people to leave the northern half of the Gaza Strip within 24 hours. Hamas told them not to go.
Israeli military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said troops backed by tanks had mounted raids to attack Palestinian rocket crews and seek information on the location of hostages taken by Hamas.
Several thousand residents could be seen on roads heading out of the northern part of the Gaza strip, but it was impossible to tell their numbers. Many others said they would not go.
Hamas, which controls the densely populated Palestinian territory, vowed to fight until the last drop of blood. The Israeli military said a significant number of Gazans had begun moving southwards “to save themselves”.
“Death is better than leaving,” said Mohammad, 20, standing in the street outside a building reduced to rubble in an Israeli air strike two days ago near the centre of Gaza.
“I was born here, and I will die here, leaving is a stigma.”
Mosques broadcast the message: “Hold on to your homes. Hold on to your land”.
“We tell the people of northern Gaza and from Gaza City, stay put in your homes, and your places,” Eyad Al-Bozom, spokesman for the Hamas Interior Ministry, told a news conference.
The U.N. said Israel’s call for Gaza civilians to leave was impossible to carry out “without devastating humanitarian consequences”, prompting a rebuke from Israel which said it should condemn Hamas and support Israel’s right to self-defence.
“The noose around the civilian population in Gaza is tightening. How are 1.1 million people supposed to move across a densely populated war zone in less than 24 hours?” U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths wrote on social media.
BLINKEN MEETINGS
The International Committee of the Red Cross said it would be impossible for aid organisations to assist “such a massive displacement of people in Gaza” while it remains under Israeli siege.
“The needs are staggering, and humanitarian organisations must be able to increase aid operations.”
Washington, which has called on Israel to protect civilians, showed no hesitancy in public support for its ally. White House national security spokesman John Kirby said such a huge evacuation was a “tall order”, but that Washington would not second guess the decision to tell civilians to get out.
“We understand what they’re trying to do and why they’re trying to do this – to try to isolate the civilian population from Hamas, which is their real target,” he said on MSNBC.
Israel’s evacuation order applies to the northern half of the Gaza Strip, including the enclave’s biggest settlement Gaza City. The U.N. said it had been told that Israel wanted the area’s entire population – around half the 2.3 million Gazans – to move across the Gaza Wadi wetland that bisects the enclave.
“Civilians of Gaza City, evacuate south for your own safety and the safety of your families and distance yourself from Hamas terrorists who are using you as human shields,” the Israeli military said.
Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority that is a rival of Hamas, told U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Jordan that the forced displacement of Palestinians in Gaza would constitute a repeat of 1948, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled or were driven from what is now Israel. Most Gazans are the descendants of such refugees.
Gaza is already one of the most crowded places on earth, and for now there is no way out. Israel has imposed a total blockade, and Egypt, which also has a border with the enclave, has so far resisted calls to open it to fleeing residents.
Cairo said Israel’s call on Gazans to leave their homes was a violation of international humanitarian law that would put civilians in danger.
‘I PROMISE YOU WE WILL WIN’
Since Hamas fighters burst across the barrier fence and killed 1,300 Israelis on Saturday, Israel has responded with the most intensive air strikes of its 75-year conflict with the Palestinians. Gaza authorities say 1,800 people have been killed; the United Nations says 400,000 people have already been made homeless.
Hamas issued a video on Friday purporting to show its fighters cuddling a baby and a toddler in one of the villages it ransacked. Israel has said entire families were slaughtered.
“We are fighting for our home. We are fighting for our future,” Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said, meeting U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who came a day after Secretary of State Antony Blinken. “The path will be long, but ultimately I promise you we will win.”
Austin said military aid was flowing into Israel but that this was the time for resolve and not revenge.
On Friday Blinken travelled to Jordan where he met King Abdullah as well as Abbas, whose Palestinian Authority exercises limited self-rule in the Israeli-occupied West Bank but lost control of Gaza to Hamas in 2007. Blinken later travelled to Qatar, a U.S. ally with influence among Islamist groups.
In the West Bank, demonstrators supporting Gaza fought gunbattles with Israeli security forces. Palestinian officials said 11 people were shot dead.
There have also been fears of hostilities spreading to new fronts, including Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, where clashes this week have already been the deadliest since 2006.
Israeli shelling struck a Lebanese army observation post at the border on Friday. The Israeli military said it fired in response to a suspected armed infiltration, which it later said had been a false alarm. Lebanese state media reported that shells struck near Alma Al-Shaab and Dhayra, the sites of repeated clashes in the past week.
Reuters news videographer Issam Abdallah was killed on Friday while working in southern Lebanon, part of a Reuters crew providing a live video signal.
“We are urgently seeking more information, working with authorities in the region, and supporting Issam’s family and colleagues,” Reuters said.
(Reporting by Henriette Chacar, Dedi Hayun, Maayan Lubell, Emily Rose, James Mackenzie in Jerusalem, Michelle Nichols in New York, Emma Farge in Geneva, Jeff Mason in Washington, Humeyra Pamuk in Tel Aviv, Steve Gorman and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles and Emma Farge in Geneva; Writing by Michael Martina, Michael Perry, Michael Georgy and Philippa Fletcher; Editing by Howard Goller, Diane Craft, Lincoln Feast, Nick Macfie, Peter Graff)
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JERUSALEM/NEW YORK/TEL AVIV (Reuters) -Israel’s military on Friday called for all civilians of Gaza City, more than 1 million people, to relocate south within 24 hours, as it amassed tanks ahead of an expected ground invasion after a devastating attack by the militant group Hamas.
“Now is a time for war,” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Thursday as Israeli warplanes continued pounding Gaza in retaliation for the weekend attacks by Hamas militants that killed more than 1,300 Israelis, mostly civilians.
The Israeli military said it would operate “significantly” in Gaza City in coming days and civilians should only return when advised. More than 1,500 Palestinians have already been killed in retaliatory attacks.
“Civilians of Gaza City, evacuate south for your own safety and the safety of your families and distance yourself from Hamas terrorists who are using you as human shields,” the military said.
“Hamas terrorists are hiding in Gaza City inside tunnels underneath houses and inside buildings populated with innocent Gazan civilians.”
A Hamas official urged citizens not to fall for what it called “fake propaganda”. Its military wing later said that 13 among scores of people it captured from Israel had been killed in the latest Israeli air strikes.
The Palestinian envoy to Japan accused the Israelis of seeking to completely destroy Gaza while the United Nations said it considered it impossible for such a movement of people to take place “without devastating humanitarian consequences”.
Israel’s ambassador to the U.N., Gilad Erdan, described the U.N. response to Israel’s early warning to the residents of Gaza as “shameful”.
Israel has vowed to annihilate the Hamas militant group which led Saturday’s attacks and said Hamas tunnels, military compounds, senior operatives’ residences and weapons storage warehouses were among 750 military targets struck overnight.
A ground invasion of the narrow and densely populated Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million people, poses serious risk, with Hamas threatening to kill its hostages.
Hours after the Israeli evacuation call, there were no signs people were leaving Gaza City, where dozens gathered at the al-Shifa Hospital, vowing to stay put.
Pro-Palestinian protests were expected around the world and the United States and regional leaders planned meetings amid fears that conflict could spread.
The U.N. humanitarian office (OCHA) said more than 400,000 people had fled their homes in Gaza and 23 aid workers had been killed.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said generators at hospitals in Gaza could run out of fuel within hours and the U.N. World Food Program (WFP) warned food and fresh water were running dangerously low.
“The human misery caused by this escalation is abhorrent, and I implore the sides to reduce the suffering of civilians,” ICRC regional director Fabrizio Carboni said.
The U.N. Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) said it had moved its central operations center and international staff to Gaza’s south and urged Israel to spare its shelters.
‘RIDDLED WITH BULLETS’
Seeking to build support for its response, Israel’s government showed U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and NATO defense ministers graphic images of children and civilians they said Hamas had killed in a weekend rampage in Israel.
Blinken said they showed a baby “riddled with bullets”, soldiers beheaded and young people burned in their cars. “It’s simply depravity in the worst imaginable way,” he said.
Like others across the globe, Blinken urged Israel to show restraint. He also reiterated America’s support, saying: “We will always be there by your side.”
On Friday he was due to meet Jordan’s King Abdullah and Mahmoud Abbas, head of the Palestinian Authority in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Seeking to stop spillover from the war, he also planned to visit key allies Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates – some with influence on Hamas, an Islamist group backed by Iran.
Iran’s foreign minister met the head of the powerful Hezbollah movement, Hassan Nassrallah, in Lebanon, where there have been cross-border clashes with Israel since the weekend, Lebanese media outlets reported.
The foreign minister of Turkey, which has offered mediation over Gaza, talked with his counterpart from the UAE, a Turkish foreign ministry source said, and will visit Egypt on Friday.
The U.S. military is placing no conditions on its security assistance to Israel, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said, adding Washington expected it to “do the right things”. Austin was due to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel on Friday.
SAFETY CONCERNS PROMPT SECURITY MEASURES
The United States and Japan were among countries offering charter flights for their citizens wanting to leave Israel.
Police in Paris used tear gas and water cannon to break up a banned rally in support of the Palestinians.
Some Jewish schools in Amsterdam and London were set to close temporarily due to safety concerns and police in New York and Los Angeles stepped up their presence around synagogues and Jewish community centers.
The Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee, an Arab advocacy group, said on Thursday that FBI agents had visited mosques and U.S. residents with Palestinian roots, calling it a “troubling trend”.
In Jerusalem, scores of Israelis gathered at the Mount Herzl military cemetery to bury their dead.
“I could not imagine this is how it would end,” one mourner said.
In Gaza’s main southern city Khan Younis, dead were being buried in empty lots, like the Samour family, killed on Wednesday night in a strike that hit their house.
“This war is harsh beyond imagining,” said Ibrahim Hamdan, who has worked through repeated wars since becoming a rescuer in 2007.
Gazans, mainly descendants of refugees who fled or were expelled from homes in Israel at its founding in 1948, have suffered economic collapse and repeated Israeli bombardment under a blockade since Hamas seized power there 16 years ago.
A peace process meant to create a Palestinian state collapsed a decade ago and Israel’s right-wing government has cracked down in the West Bank and talked of seizing more land. Palestinian leaders say this left the population with no hope, strengthening extremists.
(Reporting by Henriette Chacar, Dedi Hayun, Maayan Lubell and Emily Rose in Jerusalem, Michelle Nichols in New York, Emma Farge in Geneva, Jeff Mason in Washington, Humeyra Pamuk in Tel Aviv, Steve Gorman and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles and Emma Farge in Geneva; Writing by Michael Martina, Michael Perry, Michael Georgy and Philippa Fletcher; Editing by Howard Goller, Diane Craft, Lincoln Feast and Nick Macfie)
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