Israel has intensified its attacks in search of what it considers to be Hamas's number one, Yahya Sinwar, while the militant group has responded with a barrage of rockets that have set off alarms in Tel Aviv, at a time when the UN and WHO warn about the seriousness of the humanitarian situation, waiting for a Security Council vote scheduled for today to bring some relief to the troubled Palestinian enclave.
Residents of the Gaza Strip assure that the round of attacks deployed by Israel in recent hours has been the most intense since hostilities began on October 7, with aerial bombardments and bursts of gunfire in the north, which in Jabalia have added also the presence of Israeli snipers who activate their weapons against anyone who tries to escape the encirclement.
In the south, meanwhile, where thousands of people have moved since Israel ordered the evacuation, Israeli fire hit the head of the checkpoint enabled to receive humanitarian aid, according to Palestinian versions.
The objective of the attacks is to weaken and find Yahya Sinwar, who is credited with designing the brutal attack on October 7 that caused the death of some 1,200 people and led to the kidnapping of another 240. Israeli intelligence believes that he is located hidden in the tunnels of Khan Yunis, the second most important city in Gaza and the one that has been most severely punished in the south of the Strip.
Many of his men, who make up the al-Qasam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, have fallen, but Sinwar has managed to escape the siege on at least two occasions in recent weeks. The Israeli Army and intelligence have appealed to the testimony of hostages released during the only truce observed in the conflict, to try to draw a profile of the man for whose head $400,000 has been offered.
The Israeli offensive has gone further, and aviation and artillery have fired this Thursday against Hezbollah positions in Lebanonin response to the launch of projectiles from Lebanese territory.
Hamas has also remained active, and this Thursday it directed a rocket attack towards Tel Aviv, which turned on the air raid sirens in the capital, although no victims or damage to infrastructure have been reported as a result of the offensive.
Humanitarian crisis at its peak
The UN warned this Thursday, December 21, that The famine situation in several areas of Gaza has reached the maximum level of “humanitarian catastrophe”according to a scale applied by non-governmental organizations to evaluate the severity of the conflict for the civilian population.
According to the NGO Action Against Hunger, one in four Gazan households is suffering from starvation after two and a half months of a conflict that has caused the displacement of 85% of the population of the already overcrowded enclave.
“The lack of food is so extreme that one in four households in Gaza suffers from starvation, alarmingly high rates of acute malnutrition among the youngest children and significant excess mortality,” Action Against Hunger warned this Thursday.
According to the UN, 90% of the population has reached some level of crisis, emergency or catastrophe as a result of hunger, and the north is close to reporting extremes that lead to a declaration of famine, which has only been issued four times in the past. last 40 years, in Ethiopia (1984), North Korea (1995), Somalia (2011) and South Sudan (2017).
Additionally, The World Health Organization has described the situation of hospitals in the territory as “catastrophic.”. While in the north there are none functioning, in the south only nine of the 36 exist, after having received 246 attacks against health facilities.
“Our staff are running out of words to describe the catastrophic situation facing our patients and health workers,” the WHO representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Richard Peeperkorn, said in a press conference broadcast online.
The spokesman for the Gaza Ministry of Health, Ashraf Al Qudra, denounced that the lack of services in the largest hospital in the Strip, Shifa, has caused the death of hundreds of wounded people.
Expected pronouncement
The UN Security Council will debate again on Thursday a formula proposed by the United Arab Emirates to suspend hostilities and try to bring relief to the people of Gaza.
A resolution in this regard was to be analyzed on Tuesday, but the vote was suspended to carry out a new round of negotiations to avoid the veto of the United States, which exercised this power in the previous meeting of the Security Council.
The text presented by the United Arab Emirates provides for the opening of the Kerem Shalom crossing, a border point between the Gaza Strip and Israel, to bring humanitarian assistance from there by land, air and sea.
The Red Sea is shielded
But while the agreement for the relief of the Gazan population is delayed, the Western consensus on protecting the Red Sea maritime trade route from attacks by the Houthi rebels in Yemen is advancing.
This Thursday the European Union decided to join Operation “Guardian of Prosperity”, as the United States has called the military coalition that will be deployed through the international naval group Combined Maritime Forces, in order to protect commercial ships from some attacks that have intensified since the outbreak of the conflict in Gaza.
“The irresponsible actions of the Houthis are a threat to freedom of navigation in the Red Sea,” said EU Foreign Affairs Representative Josep Borrell.during the emergency meeting of the bloc's Political and Security Committee, in which it was decided to join the operation promoted by the Pentagon.
Between 10 and 15% of world trade passes through the Red Sea, and that exchange has been threatened in recent months by attacks by Houthi rebels, who are supported by Iran.
The details of the accession must still be discussed among the 27, since countries like Spain have not yet decided how they will participate, but others like Greece have already committed part of their military fleet.
Ceasefire in embers
Hamas representatives who are negotiating a new truce with Egyptian mediation announced this Thursday that there will be no more exchanges of hostages until an agreement is reached for a total cessation of hostilities.
Hamas sources revealed to the EFE news agency that proposals presented by Egypt, Qatar and the United States were rejected, which put on the table the Israeli offer to stop the conflict for two weeks to make the exchange viable.
However, Hamas responded that there will be no new releases of hostages until Israel commits to a complete cessation of attacks. and the total withdrawal of the troops stationed in the enclave.
With EFE and AP
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