To allow humanitarian relief to reach Gaza, European Union officials encouraged pauses in Israeli bombing and Hamas rocket strikes. Meanwhile, U.S. President Joe Biden warned Iran’s supreme commander not to target American forces in the Middle East.
Israel’s military has begun conducting small-scale raids into Gaza as it prepares for a ground invasion of the enclave. Early on Friday, it announced that it was “currently conducting raids in the Gaza Strip as part of preparations for the next stage of the operation.”
Early on Friday, according to media linked to Hamas, Palestinian militants and Israeli forces engaged in combat in at least two locations within the beachfront enclave close to the Israeli border.
According to the sources, Israeli military vehicles stormed the center region of Al-Bureij, and forces were engaged in combat with terrorists close to the border. According to the reports, Israeli forces and Hamas terrorists were exchanging gunfire in a border region near the town of Rafah in the south.
Reuters could not immediately verify the reports. The 193-member U.N. General Assembly will discuss the issue of humanitarian pauses or ceasefire agreements in the Hamas-run coastal enclave on Friday in a draft resolution Arab states submitted, urging a ceasefire as the situation for Palestinian civilians worsens.
No nation has a veto in the General Assembly, unlike the Security Council, whose resolutions for Gaza funding were rejected this week. Resolutions have political weight but are not legally binding.
Israel launched bombardments on the heavily populated Gaza Strip in response to the Hamas offensive on Israeli settlements on October 7. Israel claims that Hamas has killed almost 1,400 people, some of whom were minors, and kidnapped over 200 captives, some of whom were elderly folks and newborns.
EU DISAGREEMENT
After deliberation, the 27 E.U. leaders arrived at a compromise statement in Brussels that expressed their “gravest concern for the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza.”
They requested “continued, rapid, safe and unhindered humanitarian access and aid to reach those in need through all necessary measures including humanitarian corridors and pauses for humanitarian needs.”
E.U. officials have been vocal in their condemnation of Hamas’s attack. Still, they have found it difficult to maintain a consistent stance beyond that, with some highlighting Israel’s right to self-defense and others highlighting concerns for Palestinian civilians.
In a different statement, Mamadou Sow, the regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross, stated from Jeddah that “it would be an understatement to say that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is catastrophic.” In Gaza, everything necessary to maintain life is either absent or running out every hour.”
According to the health ministry in Gaza on Thursday, two thousand nine hundred thirteen were among the 7,028 Palestinians who died due to the retaliatory airstrikes. On Thursday, the ministry released a 212-page document listing the names and I.D. numbers of the nearly 7,000 Palestinians it claims Israel’s bombing killed.
UNRWA, the U.N. organization for Palestinian refugees, provides housing to an estimated 613,000 people who have been rendered homeless.
MORE US TROOPS ARE SENT TO THE REGION
Governments in the West and the Middle East fear that if Israel keeps bombing Palestinians in the Gaza Strip or launches a ground invasion in retaliation for Hamas’s surprise and shock attack on October 7, backed by Tehran, a wider regional conflict may break out.
Over the past week, more than a dozen attacks against American personnel in Iraq and Syria have occurred, according to Washington, which believes Iran is supporting these militants. Hezbollah, a group headquartered in Lebanon, and Israel have traded gunfire. Over the last three weeks, the U.S. has dispatched fighter planes and warships to the area.
To strengthen American personnel’s air defenses, the Pentagon announced on Thursday that roughly 900 additional American soldiers had landed in the Middle East or were on their way there.
According to the White House, Biden warned Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran, not to strike American forces stationed there. The United States “will not be spared from this fire,” Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian warned at the U.N. on Thursday if Israel’s onslaught against Hamas did not end.
In response to a question on the potential for conflict with Iran, Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant stated that his country had “no interest in expanding the war.”
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