Israel says will coordinate with Egypt before Rafah offensive

MUNICH, (AFP): Israel will coordinate with Egypt before launching any military offensive in the southern Gazan border city Rafah, the Israeli foreign minister pledged Friday.

"We will operate in Rafah after we coordinate with Egypt," Israel Katz told journalists on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, where 180 dignitaries have gathered to discuss conflicts around the globe.

"Egypt is our ally, we have peace agreements with Egypt, and we will operate in a way that does not hurt the Egyptian interests," he said.

Fears had been growing for the hundreds of thousands of people who have fled the north of Gaza to Rafah as Israeli troops advanced into the territory.

But Israel is now planning a major operation in the overcrowded city. With the border to Egypt closed, nearly 1.5 million Palestinians are essentially trapped there.

Satellite images obtained by AFP show machinery building a wall along the highly secure frontier.

Katz underlined that US President Joe Biden would also be briefed on any military offensive, as he stressed his country's determination to push ahead with the operation.

"If Sinwar and the Hamas murderers think that they can find protection in Rafah, it will not happen," he said, referring to Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar.

"That's why we will offer the civilians safe areas they can go to, and we will then deal with Hamas."

According to the Wall Street Journal and an Egyptian NGO, Cairo is constructing a walled camp in the Sinai Peninsula to receive displaced Palestinian civilians from the Gaza Strip, according to a media report and an Egyptian human rights monitor.

The compound, part of "contingency plans" if ceasefire talks in Cairo failed, could accommodate more than 100,000 people, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

The Sinai Foundation for Human Rights, an Egyptian NGO, also released a report this week that it said showed construction of the compound to receive Palestinian refugees "in the case of a mass exodus".

Israel has said it had no plans to move civilians there.

Israel has besieged the Gaza Strip since October 7.