The Israeli military signaled that major fighting in northern Gaza had ended and said it had completed the dismantling of Hamas' infrastructure, as its war with the terrorist group Hamas entered its fourth month on Sunday.
The military did not discuss any future deployment of troops to northern Gaza. Spokesman Maj. Gen. Daniel Hagari said late Saturday that troops would “further advance their gains” there and strengthen defenses along the Israel-Gaza border fence, with a focus on the central and southern parts of the territory.
The announcement was made ahead of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's visit to Israel.
Blinken and other Biden administration officials have urged Israel to scale back its heavy air and ground offensive in the Gaza Strip and move toward more targeted attacks against Hamas leaders to prevent harm to Palestinian civilians. I have repeatedly asked them to do so.
In recent weeks, Israel has already scaled back its military offensive in northern Gaza and ramped up its offensive in the southern Gaza Strip, where most of Gaza's 2.3 million Palestinians have been hit by Israeli airstrikes. , forced into small areas by humanitarian disasters.
The war was sparked by Hamas' October 7 attack on southern Israel, in which terrorists killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took about 250 hostages.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted that the war will not end until the objectives of eliminating Hamas, returning Israeli hostages and ensuring Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel are achieved.
Israeli air, land and sea retaliation has killed more than 22,700 Palestinians and injured more than 58,000, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Strip's health ministry.
The death toll does not distinguish between combatants and civilians.
Health authorities said about two-thirds of the deaths were women and minors.
Israel accuses Hamas of operating in densely populated residential areas and causing heavy civilian casualties.
On Sunday, officials at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis received 18 bodies, including 12 children, killed in an Israeli attack late Saturday.
More than 50 people were injured in an attack on a house in Khan Yunis refugee camp. The refugee camp was established decades ago to house refugees from the 1948 Middle East war over the creation of the state of Israel, and turned into a neighborhood of the city.
A house between Khan Yunis and the southern city of Rafah was also struck, killing at least seven people and their bodies taken to a nearby European hospital, an Associated Press reporter at the facility said.
Israeli forces have advanced deep into the central city of Deir al-Balah, and residents in several neighborhoods were warned to evacuate their homes in leaflets dropped across the city on Saturday.
The international medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières, known as MSF, has announced that it is evacuating medical staff and their families from Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir Al-Balah due to increased danger.
“The situation became so dangerous that some staff living in nearby areas were unable to leave their homes due to the constant threat of drones and snipers,” said Carolina Lopez, the hospital's emergency coordinator. ” he said.
She said a bullet penetrated the wall of the hospital's intensive care unit on Friday, and in recent days “there have been drone attacks and sniper attacks just a few hundred meters from the hospital.”
The group included approximately 50 Palestinian and foreign medical staff at the hospital. Lopez said the hospital has been receiving between 150 and 200 injured people every day in recent weeks. “Some days there were more deaths than injuries,” she said. “No one is safe anywhere in Gaza.”
Stay up to date on news about the Israel-Hamas war and the rise in global anti-Semitism with The Post's Israel War Update delivered straight to your inbox every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Military spokesman Hagari said sporadic fighting was expected in northern Gaza, from where rockets would be fired sporadically toward Israel.
He said that while Hamas is no longer operating systematically in the region, there are still terrorists “without a framework and without a commander.”
The military has claimed, without providing evidence, that it has killed more than 8,000 Hamas fighters.
Hagari said Israeli forces would behave differently in the south than in northern Gaza, where heavy shelling and ground fighting have devastated entire neighborhoods.
He said urban refugee camps currently being targeted by the military were crowded with armed groups, and that a “vast underground city of tunnels” had been discovered beneath Khan Yunis.
He said the military was “applying the lessons we have learned” but did not elaborate. Echoing the views of Israeli political leaders, he said fighting “will continue throughout 2024.”
His comments about changing the way the military fights appeared to agree with Mr. Blinken, who is on his fourth trip to the Middle East in three months.
In addition to calling for a reduction in the heavy fighting, Blinken called for more aid to reach Gaza and urged Israeli leaders to develop a vision for a post-war Gaza.
Two U.S. senators who inspected aid deliveries over the weekend described red tape that is delaying relief to Palestinians in besieged areas. The main cause is Israel's inspection of cargo trucks, which appears to be an arbitrary denial of critical humanitarian supplies.
The system that keeps aid supplies in Gaza from being attacked by Israeli forces is “completely broken,” said Democratic Sens. Chris Van Hollen and Jeff Merkley.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration and Prime Minister Netanyahu remain wide apart over who will govern the post-war territory, with Israeli leaders seeking a reformed plan to eventually establish an autonomous government in parts of the occupied West Bank. It has repeatedly rejected the U.S. government's idea to establish a Palestinian Authority to govern Gaza.
Further complicating Mr. Blinken's task is a new escalation in cross-border fighting between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah, straining U.S. efforts to contain the regional conflagration. There is.
Hezbollah described Saturday's fighting as an “initial response” to the targeted killing of a senior Hamas official in Hezbollah's stronghold in the Lebanese capital Beirut last week.
The attack is presumed to have been carried out by Israel.
