World leaders urge Israel to avoid ‘catastrophic’ Rafah op
GAZA STRIP, Palestinian Territories: Israel’s vow to push ahead with a ‘powerful’ operation in Gaza’s Rafah was met with a growing chorus of international condemnation Thursday, with leaders warning against catastrophic consequences for the 1.5 million Palestinians trapped there.
Australia, Canada and New Zealand warned Israel ‘not to go down this path’, issuing a rare joint statement in the latest urgent appeal seeking to avert further mass civilian casualties.
“An expanded military operation would be devastating,” they said. “There is simply nowhere else for civilians to go.”
Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians have been driven into Gaza’s southernmost city by Israel’s relentless military campaign, seeking shelter in a sprawling makeshift encampment near the Egypt border.
Despite pressure from foreign governments and aid agencies not to invade, Israel insists it must push into Rafah and eliminate Hamas battalions.
“We will fight until complete victory and this includes a powerful action also in Rafah after we allow the civilian population to leave the battle zones,” Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu said in a statement on Wednesday.
His threats of an imminent incursion come as mediators race for a truce in the four-month-old war, which has flattened vast swathes of Gaza, displaced most of the territory’s population and pushed people to the brink of starvation.
Should the Israeli assault on Rafah go ahead, the risk of atrocities is ‘serious, real and high’, the United Nations’ special adviser on the prevention of genocide, Alice Wairimu Nderitu, said Wednesday.
In Cairo, mediators from the United States, Qatar and Egypt are seeking to broker a deal that would suspend fighting and see the release of the roughly 130 hostages still in Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
“Israel did not receive in Cairo any new proposal of Hamas on the release of our hostages,”
Netanyahu’s office said in a statement following Israeli media reports that the country’s delegation was told not to rejoin negotiations until Hamas softens its stance. While he did not comment directly on the reports, Netanyahu said: “I insist that Hamas drop their delusional demands, and when they drop these demands we can move forward.”
On Tuesday, CIA director William Burns joined the talks with David Barnea, head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, while a Hamas delegation was in Cairo Wednesday.
Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas, who governs the Israeli-occupied West Bank, called on Hamas to “rapidly” agree to a truce and stave off further tragedy for Palestinians.
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation meanwhile revealed that its director, Christopher Wray, had made an unannounced trip to Israel to meet with the country’s law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
Wray also met with FBI agents based in Tel Aviv, according to a statement from the bureau. While truce negotiations enter their third day, Israel’s military has kept up its bombardment of Gaza. On Thursday, the Hamasrun ministry of health said 107 people, ‘mostly women and children,’ were killed in overnight attacks.
An expanded military operation would be devastating. There is simply nowhere else for civilians to go.
Australia, Canada and New Zealand