Israel-Hamas war: Full-scale Rafah offensive ‘cannot take place’: UN rights chief
Israel struck Gaza and troops were battling militants after an evacuation order sent hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fleeing Rafah. Warning: Graphic content.
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A full-scale Israeli assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah “cannot take place”, the UN human rights chief has insisted, saying it could not be reconciled with international law.
“I can see no way that the latest evacuation orders, much less a full assault, in an area with an extremely dense presence of civilians, can be reconciled with the binding requirements of international humanitarian law and with the two sets of binding provisional measures ordered by the International Court of Justice,” Volker Turk said in a statement.
Israel struck Gaza on Sunday and troops were battling militants in several areas of the Palestinian territory after an Israeli evacuation order sent hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fleeing from Rafah.
More than seven months into the Israel-Hamas war, UN chief Antonio Guterres urged “an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, the unconditional release of all hostages and an immediate surge in humanitarian aid” into the besieged Gaza Strip.
“But a ceasefire will only be the start,” Guterres told a donor conference in Kuwait. “It will be a long road back from the devastation and trauma of this war.”
As Egyptian, Qatari and US mediation efforts towards a truce appeared to stall, US President Joe Biden said a ceasefire could be achieved “tomorrow” if Hamas released the hostages held in Gaza since the October 7 attack that sparked the war.
Israeli air strikes pounded parts of northern, central and southern Gaza during the night and into Sunday morning.
In Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city which sits on the Egyptian border, the Kuwaiti hospital said on Sunday it had received the bodies of “18 martyrs” killed in Israeli strikes over the past 24 hours.
Gaza’s civil defence agency reported at least two fatalities, a father and son, both doctors, in a strike on Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.
Months after Israel said it had dismantled Hamas’s command structure in northern Gaza, which was devastated by intense violence in the early stages of the war, fighting has resumed in recent days in the Jabalia refugee camp and Gaza City’s Zeitun neighbourhood.
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ISRAEL ORDERS THOUSANDS MORE EVACUATIONS FROM RAFAH
Israel has told tens of thousands more Palestinians to evacuate Rafah, as it intensifies military operations in southern Gaza.
Residents in the city’s eastern districts were told to go to al-Mawasi – a narrow coastal area which Israel calls an “expanded humanitarian zone”.
It came as the US issued a stunning criticism of Israel’s use of American weapons in the Gaza war, after Israeli forces intensified operations around the southern city of Rafah, where more than a million displaced people are sheltering.
Israel’s main international ally said in a report that it was “reasonable to assess” that Israel has used weapons in ways inconsistent with international humanitarian law during the seven-month war.
But the long-awaited State Department report said it could not reach “conclusive findings” and stopped short of blocking weapons shipments.
Relations between the two allies slumped earlier in the week after US President Joe Biden said he would halt some arms deliveries if Israel went ahead with a full-scale assault on Rafah threatened by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The US has warned that the reputational damage Israel will suffer if it storms a city where an estimated 1.4 million civilians are sheltering will far outweigh any possible military gain.
AFP journalists witnessed strikes in several parts of Gaza early Saturday, after reporting artillery strikes on Rafah a day earlier.
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IDF PREPPING TO LAUNCH ATTACK ON HAMAS
The Israeli military is preparing to launch a new operation in northern Gaza’s Jabaliya, after identifying attempts by Hamas to regroup there.
The IDF estimates there are between 100,000 and 150,000 Palestinians in the evacuation zone. They are being called to move to shelters in western Gaza.
EVACUATE RAFAH NOW
The Israeli military is calling on Palestinians in additional neighbourhoods of Rafah to evacuate the area, as it presses on with its operation against Hamas in the city in the southern Gaza Strip.
GLOBAL PROTESTS CONTINUE
Pro-Palestinian students and other supporters gathered outside of the Bobst Library at New York University (NYU) in Manhattan to protest the schools stance on Israel in New York City. Across the world, students have been protesting and demanding that their colleges and universities divest from companies working with Israel as the war in Gaza continues. The demonstrations come as an increasing number of college graduation ceremonies have been cancelled for fear of disrupting protests.
ROCKETS FIRED INTO GAZA
The Israeli army said more than a dozen rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel Friday, including one that hit a populated area of Beersheba, where one woman was wounded.
In a statement, the Israeli military said that nine rockets were launched from the area of Rafah, in the far south of the Gaza Strip, and five more from the centre of the Palestinian territory.
All of the rockets were targeted towards Beersheba, Israel’s largest southern city, marking the first time since December that sirens had sounded in the area warning of incoming rockets.
None of the rockets were intercepted, the military told AFP, adding that all but one had struck open areas.
“One of these rocket fell in Beersheba city,” the military said. A 37-year-old woman was wounded by shrapnel from the rocket, which struck a park, Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency medical service said in a statement.
She had been hit in the leg, but was “fully conscious and in mild condition,” it said, adding that she had been taken to hospital.
Hamas’s armed wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, said it had carried out rocket launches in a statement published on Telegram.
UN’S GRIM GAZA FORECAST AS AID HALTED
UN chief Antonio Guterres has warned that Gaza risked an “epic humanitarian disaster” as Israeli military operations around its far-southern city of Rafah effectively halted aid operations.
Earlier this week, Israeli ground troops seized eastern areas of the city, including the Palestinian side of the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza, but they have yet to enter its main built-up area.
Media witnessed artillery strikes on the city on Friday local time and the Israeli army said operations were continuing in the east of the city.
“On the Gazan side of the Rafah crossing, the troops eliminated several terror cells during close-quarters combat and with an aerial strike,” the military said.
But there was no sign yet of the full-scale assault promised by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu even after US President Joe Biden threatened to halt some arms deliveries if he goes ahead.
“If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone,” Mr Netanyahu said in a statement.
“We are determined and we are united in order to defeat our enemies and those who want to destroy us.”
Mr Netanyahu has said repeatedly that Israel cannot defeat Hamas and extinguish any possibility of the militant group repeating its bloody October 7 attack without sending ground troops into Rafah in search of remaining Hamas fighters.
But Washington has warned that the reputational damage Israel will suffer if it storms a city where an estimated 1.4 civilians are sheltering will far outweigh any possible military gain.
FRANCE CALLS ON ISRAEL TO END RAFAH OPERATION
The French foreign ministry has condemned Israel’s attack on Rafah and described the military operation as threatening to “cause a catastrophic situation for the civilian population of Gaza”.
In a statement, the ministry said that civilians in Gaza have “no safe area” and called on Israel to stop its military offensive against Rafah and return to negotiations, which is said was “the only possible path to lead to the immediate release of hostages and obtain a lasting ceasefire”.
France also called on Israel to reopen the Rafah border crossings between Gaza and Egypt, so that humanitarian aid can enter the Palestinian territory.
They also denounced Israeli settler attacks on aid shipments destined for Gaza, adding that Israeli authorities should put an end to “settler violence”.
#Israël#Territoirespalestiniens l La France déplore le lancement le 7 mai d’une opération militaire de l’armée israélienne à Rafah. Une telle opération menace de provoquer une situation catastrophique pour les populations civiles de Gaza.
— France Diplomatie🇫🇷🇪🇺 (@francediplo) May 10, 2024
Déclaration âž¡ï¸ https://t.co/x3tpYqHnaapic.twitter.com/mhNkswCrzw
UN VOTES IN FAVOUR OF PALESTINIAN MEMBERSHIP
The United Nations General Assembly, including Australia, voted overwhelmingly on Friday local time to grant the Palestinians some additional rights in the global body, after their drive for full membership was blocked by the United States.
“I have stood hundreds of times before at this podium, but never for a more significant vote than the one about to take place, a historic one,” Palestinian ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour said before the vote, his voice full of emotion.
He added, “The day will come where Palestine will take its rightful place among the community of free nations.” Israel reacted angrily, with its UN ambassador, Gilad Erdan, saying the resolution made him sick.
“With this new precedent, we may see here representatives of ISIS or Boko Haram that will sit among us,” Erdan said, referring to two jihadist groups.
He said it would give “the rights of a state to an entity that is already partly controlled by terrorists, and will be replaced by a force of child-murdering Hamas rapists.”
US deputy ambassador to the UN Robert Wood called the resolution “an unproductive text.” While “our vote does not reflect opposition to Palestinian statehood,” Mr Wood said after the resolution passed, “it remains the US view that unilateral measures at the UN and on the ground will not advance this goal”.
With the war in Gaza raging, the Palestinians in April relaunched a request dating back to 2011 to become full members of the United Nations, where their current status is that of a “non-member observer state.” To succeed, the initiative needed a Security Council green light and then a two-thirds majority vote in the General Assembly.
But the United States — one of five veto-holding members on the Security Council and Israel’s closest ally — blocked it on April 18.
The resolution, introduced by the United Arab Emirates, says, “The State of Palestine is qualified for membership in the United Nations in accordance with Article 4 of the Charter and should therefore be admitted.” It calls on the Security Council to “reconsider the matter favourably.” The United States, however, opposes any recognition of statehood outside of a bilateral accord between the Palestinians and Israel, whose current right-wing government is adamantly opposed to a two-state solution.
While the passing of the resolution will “have a profound impact on the future of the Palestinian people,” said UAE Ambassador Mohamed Issa Abushahab, it “does not do justice to the state of Palestine, as it only grants additional rights, meaning that Palestine will remain an observer state.”
WHY AUSTRALIA BACKED UN VOTE
Foreign Minister Penny Wong says the “rejection of Hamas” is one of the reasons why Australia voted in favour to support a bid for Palestine to become a member of the UN. Australia – along with 142 other nations – passed the General Assembly resolution on Friday (local time) by recognising Palestine’s qualification to join the organisation.
“What it did do, consistent with the two-state solution, was to express the General Assembly’s aspiration for Palestinian membership of the United Nations, noting that this must be recommended by the UN Security Council,” Ms Wong said during a media conference on Saturday.
CEASEFIRE TALKS STALL OVER RAFAH INVASION
Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to “fight with our fingernails” while dismissing Joe Biden’s warning that he wouldn’t provide arms for a major military operation in Rafah.
“If we have to stand alone, we will stand alone. If we need to, we will fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than fingernails,” Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu made the comments after delegations for Israel and Hamas, as well as CIA chief Bill Burns, left the ceasefire negotiations in Cairo.
It was unclear whether the talks had broken down or simply paused, but the failure to reach an agreement in this week’s round of meetings has raised fears of an imminent Israeli attack on Rafah.
Israel has defied international objections by sending in tanks and conducting “targeted raids” in the border city, which is crowded with displaced Palestinian civilians.
The United Nations agency supporting Palestinian refugees said on Thursday about 80,000 people had fled Rafah in the three days since Israel intensified its military operations in the southern Gaza city.
“Since Israeli forces military operation intensified on 6 May, around 80,000 people have fled Rafah, seeking refuge elsewhere,” the United Nations said, warning “the toll on these families is unbearable. Nowhere is safe”.
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