Palestinian children who fled with their parents from their houses in the Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh, gather in the backyard of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees school, in the southern port city of Sidon, Lebanon. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant in Tel Aviv. File photo
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

srael on Tuesday (September 17, 2024) expanded its stated goals of the war in Gaza to include enabling residents to return to communities in northern Israel that have been evacuated due to attacks by Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The decision was approved during an overnight meeting of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security Cabinet, Mr. Netanyahu’s office said.

Hamas’ October 7 assault on southern Israel sparked the war in Gaza. Hezbollah opened a second front against Israel a day later and fighting across the Israel-Lebanon border has since escalated, threatening to ignite a regional conflict.

Tens of thousands of Israelis were evacuated from towns along the northern frontier that have been badly damaged by rocket fire and they have yet to return.

The slogan “All eyes on Rafah” has also been widely shared in other publications and social networks, especially X. Image credit: Twitter/@IrnaEnglish

An AI-generated image bearing the words “All eyes on Rafah” has been shared by more than 44 million Instagram accounts since Monday after a deadly Israeli strike at a camp for displaced Palestinians in the Gazan city.

The image depicts densely packed rows of tents stretching endlessly across a desert landscape overshadowed by mountains, alluding to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who fled there during Israel’s military campaign against Hamas.

Chilean-U.S. actor Pedro Pascal, top models Bella and Gigi Hadid, who are of Palestinian descent, and French football star Ousmane Dembele are among the celebrities to have shared it on Instagram.

The slogan “All eyes on Rafah” has also been widely shared in other publications and social networks, especially X, where the hashtag #alleyesonrafah has attracted almost one million hits, according to online monitor Visibrain.

The platform, formerly Twitter, has also seen 27.5 million messages published in three days about the attack on the southern Gazan city bordering Egypt that generated international outrage.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said an Israeli strike on the camp that sparked a fire on Sunday killed 45 people and injured 249.

Israel’s military said it had targeted and killed two senior Hamas militants, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaking of a “tragic accident” that his government was investigating.

The deadliest Gaza war was sparked by Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on southern Israel which resulted in the deaths of 1,189 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

Militants also took 252 hostages, 121 of whom remain in Gaza, including 37 the Israeli army says are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 36,171 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

Smoke rises following Israeli bombardment in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on May 12, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Israeli tanks, under cover from heavy fire from air and ground, pushed further into Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday, May 13, 2024, residents and Hamas media said, while airstrikes hammered Rafah in the south.

Also read: Biden says U.S. won’t supply weapons for Israel to attack Rafah, in warning to ally

In Jabalia, tanks were trying to advance towards the heart of the camp, the biggest of Gaza’s eight historic refugee camps. Residents said tank shells were landing at the centre of the camp and that air strikes had destroyed clusters of houses.

Israeli troops forced hundreds of Palestinians housed in shelters to leave.

In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, Israel stepped up aerial and ground bombardments on the eastern areas of the city, killing people in an air strike on a house in the Brazil neighbourhood.

“Rafah, now a ghost town”

Residents said Israeli tanks are now stationed east of the Salahuddin Road that bisects the eastern part of the city, with the highway cut off by intense fighting. Residents added the eastern part of Rafah remained a “ghost town”.

Hamas armed wing said their fighters were engaged in gun battles with Israeli forces in one of the streets east of Rafah, and in the east of Jabalia.

In Israel, the military sounded sirens several times in areas near Gaza, warning of potential Palestinian cross-border rocket and or mortar launches.

Late on Saturday, the Israeli military said forces operating in Jabalia were preventing Hamas, which rules Gaza, from re-establishing its military capabilities there.

“They were bombing everywhere, including near schools that are housing people who lost their houses,” Jabalia resident Saed, 45, told Reuters via a chat app on Sunday. “War is restarting, this is how it looks in Jabalia.”

The army sent tanks back into Zeitoun, as well as Al-Sabra, where residents also reported heavy bombardments that destroyed several houses, including high-rise residential buildings.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday warned that Israel was risking facing an insurgency in Gaza without a post-war plan for the enclave.

The death toll in Israel’s military operation in Gaza has now passed at least 35,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry. The bombardment has laid waste to the coastal enclave and caused a deep humanitarian crisis.

The war was triggered by a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7 in which some 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 people taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel says 620 soldiers have been killed in the fighting, more than half of them during the initial Hamas assault.

File picture of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
| Photo Credit: AP

Turkey has halted all exports and imports to and from Israel, citing the escalating humanitarian situation in Gaza, announced the Turkish Ministry of Trade, Al Jazeera reported.

“Export and import transactions related to Israel have been stopped, covering all products,” the Ministry said in a statement on May 3.

“Turkey will strictly and decisively implement these new measures until the Israeli Government allows an uninterrupted and sufficient flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza.

“The decision follows remarks by Israel’s foreign minister, who accused Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of violating agreements by obstructing Israeli imports and exports from ports.

“This is how a dictator behaves, disregarding the interests of the Turkish people and businessmen, and ignoring international trade agreements,” Foreign Minister Israel Katz posted on X.

Mr. Katz disclosed that he has directed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to explore alternative trade options with Turkey, focusing on domestic production and imports from other nations. In 2023, the trade volume between the two nations amounted to $6.8 billion.

Last month, Turkey imposed trade restrictions on Israel, alleging Israel’s obstruction of Ankara’s participation in Gaza aid airdrops and its military actions in the region.

When questioned about Turkey’s continued trade relations with Israel despite Ankara’s strong rhetoric, Mr. Erdogan responded last month by stating that Turkey no longer engages in “intense trade” with Israel, asserting, “That is done.”

However, he did not explicitly state that Ankara had completely ceased all trade with Israel, Al Jazeera reported.

United Nations Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, center, addresses a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on the war in Gaza, on U.N. headquarters. File photo
| Photo Credit: AP

The United States, which has repeatedly blocked calls for a truce in Gaza, will submit a draft resolution to the UN Security Council Friday on the need for “an immediate ceasefire,” while Russia pushes for even more explicit demands for peace.

Since the start of the Israeli-Hamas war on October 7, the United States has repeatedly used its UN Security Council veto to block the world body from calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Palestinian territory.

Following their last veto at the end of February, US officials have been negotiating an alternative text focusing on support for diplomatic efforts on the ground for a six-week truce in exchange for the release of hostages.

The latest version, seen by AFP, notes the necessity for “an immediate and sustained ceasefire to protect civilians on all sides, allow for the delivery of essential humanitarian assistance, and alleviate humanitarian suffering.”

It thereby supports “diplomatic efforts to secure such a ceasefire in connection with the release of all remaining hostages.”

With the United States under strong international pressure to soften its support for key ally Israel, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that the latest resolution sends “a strong signal.”

The resolution “does call for an immediate ceasefire tied to the release of hostages, and we hope very much that countries will support that,” Blinken said in Saudi Arabia.

However, the text does not explicitly use the word “call,” instead simply stating that a ceasefire is imperative, which Russia says is too weak.

“We are not satisfied with anything which doesn’t call for an immediate ceasefire,” Russian Deputy Ambassador to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy told reporters Thursday.

Richard Gowan, an analyst at the International Crisis Group, said “the US is still not demanding a ceasefire without preconditions.”

But “even this limited shift by the US will worry the Israelis, because (Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu wants to keep the UN out of diplomacy over the war altogether.”

According to diplomatic sources, the United States now has enough votes (at least 9 out of 15) for the text to be adopted, but there remains the possibility of a veto by Russia.

US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield has said that she was “optimistic” for its adoption.

Condemnation of Hamas

In addition to the ceasefire, the text also “rejects any attempt at demographic or territorial change in Gaza” and also condemns “all acts of terrorism, including the Hamas-led attacks of October 7” against Israel.

If adopted, the resolution would mark the first time the Security Council has specifically condemned the Hamas attack, which resulted in about 1,160 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel has relentlessly pounded Gaza, where at least 31,988 people, most of them women and children, have been killed, the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory says.

Two humanitarian resolutions that have been adopted by the Council, as well as those in the General Assembly, have not mentioned Hamas, an absence lambasted by Israel.

Several non-permanent Security Council members have circulated their own draft project in recent days which “demands an immediate humanitarian ceasefire for the month of Ramadan” and the immediate release of all hostages, according to a text seen by AFP.

If the US text is rejected, then this draft “will come to the table and put to the vote and I hope it will be adopted,” said France’s UN Ambassador Nicolas de Riviere, adding that now was the “time to save lives.”

However, a vote on that text would have an equally uncertain outcome.

The Council has been largely divided on the Israeli-Palestinian issue for years and has only managed to adopt the two essentially humanitarian resolutions on the topic since October 7.

But even those had little effect: the entry of aid into Gaza remains largely insufficient and famine looms.

Several political resolutions have been rejected by US vetoes on the one hand or Russian and Chinese vetoes on the other — or by an insufficient number of votes overall.

U.S. President Joe Biden has stepped up public pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, warning he’s “hurting Israel” and speaking candidly about “come to Jesus” conversations with the leader over the growing humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Despite Mr. Biden’s increased displays of frustration, Israeli officials and Middle East analysts say no signs are emerging that Mr. Biden can push Israel, at least in the short term, to fundamentally alter how it’s prosecuting the conflict that is entering a new dangerous phase.

Read more on Israel-Palestine Conflict

“He has a right to defend Israel, a right to continue to pursue Hamas,” Mr. Biden said of Mr. Netanyahu in an MSNBC interview. “But he must, he must, he must pay more attention to the innocent lives being lost as a consequence of the actions taken. He’s hurting…in my view, he’s hurting Israel more than helping Israel.”

The U.S. President had hoped to have an extended cease-fire in place by the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which is set to begin Monday. Biden administration officials see a deal on a temporary truce in exchange for dozens of hostages as a crucial step toward finding an eventual permanent end to the conflict.

But with no deal emerging, Mr. Biden acknowledged last week that he has become more concerned about the prospect of violence in east Jerusalem. Clashes have erupted during Ramadan in recent years between Palestinians and Israeli security forces around Jerusalem’s Old City, home to major religious sites sacred to Jews, Christians and Muslims and the emotional epicenter of the Middle East conflict.

Mr. Biden this weekend warned Mr. Netanyahu that an attack on Rafah—where hundreds of thousands of displaced Gazans have congregated—would be a “red line” and that Israel “cannot have 30,000 more Palestinians dead.” At the same time, he said that his commitment to Israel’s defense is sacrosanct.

State of Union address

The President’s blunt comments came after he was caught on a hot mic following his State of Union address on Thursday telling a Democratic ally that he’s told Mr. Netanyahu they will have a “come to Jesus” talk about the humanitarian situation in Gaza.

The U.S. this month began airdrops and announced it will establish a temporary pier to get badly needed aid into Gaza via sea. U.N. officials have warned at least one quarter of Gaza’s 2.3 million people are one step away from famine. The extraordinary measures to get aid into Gaza have come as Israel has resisted U.S. calls to allow more in via land routes.

And in a move that irritated Mr. Netanyahu, Vice President Kamala Harris last week hosted a member of Israel’s wartime Cabinet, Benny Gantz, who came to Washington in defiance of the prime minister. U.S. officials said that Harris, and other senior advisers to Mr. Biden, were blunt with Gantz about their concerns about an expected Rafah operation.

Mr. Netanyahu on Sunday pushed back againstMr. Biden’s latest comments.

“Well, I don’t know exactly what the president meant, but if he meant…that I’m pursuing private policies against the majority, the wish of the majority of Israelis, and that this is hurting the interests of Israel, then he’s wrong on both counts,” Netanyahu said in a clip of an interview with Politico, released by the prime minister’s office on Sunday.

Mr. Biden’s stepped up criticism of the prime minister’s handling of the war has been an intentional effort to signal to Mr. Netanyahu that the U.S. president is running out of patience with the mounting death toll and lack of aid flow into Gaza, according to a U.S. official familiar with the president’s thinking. The official was not authorized to comment publicly and requested anonymity.

Elsewhere in Israel, the reaction to Mr. Biden’s public venting of frustration was mixed.

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid said he wasn’t surprised by Mr. Biden’s remarks. Lapid on Sunday accused Mr. Netanyahu of pandering to his base and said the prime minister had narrow political interests in mind, like placating the far-right members of his Cabinet.

The U.S. “lost faith in Mr. Netanyahu and it’s not surprising. Half of his Cabinet has lost faith in him as has the majority of Israel’s citizens,” Lapid, who briefly served as prime minister in 2022, told Israeli Army Radio. “Netanyahu must go.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz downplayed Mr. Biden’s comments, saying the U.S. backed Israel’s war aims and that was what mattered. “We must distinguish rhetoric from the essence,” he told Israeli Army Radio.

Eytan Gilboa, an expert on U.S.-Israel relations and professor at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University, said Mr. Biden’s decision to scale up aid to Gaza and warn Israel about an incursion into Rafah undermined support for Israel’s aims of dismantling Hamas’ military and governing capabilities and freeing the hostages. He said it relieved Hamas of pressure to agree to a temporary cease-fire deal.

He said Mr. Biden’s harsher comments of late came out of a frustration with Mr. Netanyahu over his reluctance to accept the U.S. vision for a postwar Gaza. Mr. Biden has called for Middle East stakeholders to reinvigorate efforts to find a two-state solution, one in which Israel would co-exist with an independent Palestinian state, once the current war ends.

Mr. Netanyahu, however, has consistently opposed establishing a Palestinian state throughout his political career.

Gilboa said Mr. Biden’s remarks were made with an eye on his reelection and were aimed at appeasing progressive Democrats. The president is facing growing pressure from the left-wing of his party to use the United States’ considerable leverage as Israel’s chief patron to force Mr. Netanyahu toward a permanent cease-fire.

More than 100,00 Michigan Democrats cast “uncommitted” ballots in the state’s primary last month, part of a coordinated effort in the battleground state intended to show Mr. Biden that he could lose much-needed support over frustration with his administration’s approach to the Israel-Hamas war.

“Netanyahu earned that criticism, but on the other hand when (Biden) criticizes Mr. Netanyahu personally, he thinks he improves his standing among progressives,” Gilboa said.

But Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that pointed criticism of the Netanyahu government has limited value for Mr. Biden politically.

“Words without deeds are not going to bring those voters back,” Miller said. “The hemorrhaging is going to continue as long as the pictures in Gaza don’t change.”

Gilboa said that even if a different government were running Israel, such as a more moderate figure like Gantz, Mr. Biden would still find a leadership intent on entering Rafah and defeating Hamas.

“They wouldn’t do things significantly different,” he said. “Is there anyone of sound mind here who is willing to leave Hamas in Gaza? That won’t happen.”

Biden administration officials pushed back against the idea that the president has become more outspoken in his criticism of Mr. Netanyahu with an eye on his 2024 prospects.

It’s not lost on Mr. Biden that Israelis across the political spectrum remain as hawkish as Mr. Netanyahu about eliminating Hamas. Still, Mr. Biden believes that by speaking out more forcefully he can sway the Israelis to do more to reduce the death toll and alleviate suffering of innocent Palestinians as Israel carries out its operations, according to the U.S. official.

Mr. Biden, who last traveled to Israel soon after Hamas’ launched its Oct. 7 attack on Israel, said in the MSNBC interview that he was open to travelling to Israel again to speak directly to the Knesset.

Privately, M. Biden has expressed a desire to aides to make another trip to Israel to try to circumvent Mr. Netanyahu and take his message directly to the people. One possibility discussed internally for a presidential trip is if a temporary cease-fire agreement is reached. Mr. Biden could use the moment to press the case directly to Israelis for humanitarian assistance in Gaza and begin outlining a path toward a permanent end to the fighting, officials said.