Israeli troops hit southern Gaza; Blinken arrives in Egypt to promote a “lasting” truce

Antony Blinken's diplomatic push takes on new urgency as Israeli troops advance toward Rafah, the last southern tip of Gaza, on the border with Egypt, where more than half of the Palestinian enclave's population has taken refuge. There is no more space to flee to or safe places.

The troops are pressing from Khan Younis, the main city in the south of the enclave and neighboring town of Rafah. Only there, their air attacks caused the death of at least 14 people, before dawn.

But in total, 127 Palestinians were killed, mostly women and children, and 143 were injured during Israeli onslaughts in the last 24 hoursindicated the local Ministry of Health.

“No place is safe, nowhere at all, where are we going?” Palestinian Mohamad Kozaat asked after six members of his family, including his daughter, were injured in an Israeli attack in the south.

Although Israel has already hit Rafah during its four-month offensive, its forces are now threatening a full-fledged incursion into the town, where they claim to be the refuge of Hamas members.

In a devastated city where the majority of civilians are overcrowded, the deaths and devastation would escalate even more, in a war that already leaves tol least 27,585 Palestinians dead, according to the latest figures from the Health portfolio issued this Tuesday.

UN: Israel's evacuation calls cover two-thirds of the territory

While pressing with bombs and artillery attacks from all fronts, the Israeli Army orders new evacuations. These now cover two thirds of the blocked territory. That is to say, 246 square kilometers of Gaza, United Nations investigators on the ground warned.

These are orders that are almost impossible to comply with for the 2.3 million Gazans who do not have the possibility of leaving their territory, unlike what has happened in conflicts in other regions.

Although in the first weeks of the war Israel allowed some departures, they were only aimed at foreigners or those Palestinians with dual nationality and a passport to prove it, which covered a small segment of its inhabitants.

One day after four months of the bloody attack by Hamas in southern Gaza, which unleashed the current escalation of hostilities, the consequences for the civilian population are worsening. A quarter of Gaza residents are hungry and 85% of the population has been driven from their homes, with hundreds of thousands crammed into makeshift camps.added the UN.

People were forced to come to this safe place, the cemetery, among the dead

For some families, there is no choice but to live among the dead, as they seek refuge in Gaza's cemeteries.

Displaced multiple times by Israel's armed operations, Mahmoud Amer and his family now live in a tent they set up near the tombstones in a cemetery in Rafah, searching for a place of relative safety on the devastated strip of land.

“People were forced to come to this safe place, which is the cemetery, among the dead (…) It is better than living in residential areas where the houses could collapse on our heads,” said Amer, a displaced man from the camp. refugees from Al-Shati, in northern Gaza, who moved to the cemetery with 11 relatives, including children and grandchildren.

They arrived there after spending weeks in other places and while the family gradually moved south, fleeing the advance of Israeli troops.

Blinken arrives in Egypt on his tour to seek a truce between the Israeli Army and Hamas

With no immediate end to the ongoing war in sight, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Egypt this Tuesday in search of progress towards an eventual agreement on a new ceasefire between the parties to the conflict. and “a lasting end” to the conflict.

Blinken is thus promoting a tour – which will also take him through Qatar, Israel and the West Bank – where he seeks to pressure in the first instance for a provisional truce, with the help of Doha and Cairo, mediators between the parties to the conflict.

In the Egyptian capital, the highest representative of Washington diplomacy met with President Abdelfatah al-Sisi to “analyze the situation in the Gaza Strip (…) And consult with the countries of the region so that the war does not spread,” state media confirmed.

The diplomat arrived in Egypt from Saudi Arabia, where he met the day before with the crown prince of that influential kingdom, Mohamed bin Salman.

Although he has not yet met with the Israeli authorities, one of the last stops of this fifth tour of the region in four months, the Netanyahu Government has already expressed obstacles to reaching a new pact like the one the two parties experienced at the end of 2023.

According to the Israeli premier, the Islamist group would have made excessive requests regarding the number of Palestinian prisoners that should be exchanged in a new truce.

The terms for the handover of the more than 100 kidnapped people remaining in the Palestinian enclave “should be similar to the previous agreement,” Netanyahu said, referring to last November's pact, in which approximately one hostage was exchanged for every three Palestinian prisoners. . All those released from Israeli prisons were women and minors.

With Reuters, AFP and AP