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Israeli military orders the evacuation of Gaza’s southern city of Rafah
Netanyahu vows to implement Trump’s Gaza plan
apnews.com
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel’s military on Monday issued sweeping evacuation orders covering Rafah and nearby areas, indicating it could soon launch another major ground operation in the Gaza Strip’s southernmost city.
Israel ended its ceasefire with the Hamas militant group and renewed its air and ground war earlier this month. At the beginning of March it cut off all supplies of food, fuel, medicine and humanitarian aid to the territory’s roughly 2 million Palestinians to pressure Hamas to accept proposed changes to the truce agreement.
Israel’s military ordered Palestinians to head to Muwasi, a sprawl of squalid tent camps along the coast. The orders came during Eid al-Fitr, a normally festive Muslim holiday marking the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.
Last May, Israel launched a major operation in Rafah, on the border with Egypt, leaving large parts in ruins. The military seized a strategic corridor along the border as well as the Rafah crossing with Egypt, Gaza’s only gateway to the outside world that was not controlled by Israel.
Israel was supposed to withdraw from the corridor under the ceasefire it signed with Hamas in January under U.S. pressure, but it later refused to do it, citing the need to prevent weapons smuggling.
On Monday, people fled with their belongings loaded onto donkeys and stacked on car roofs. Families traveled by foot carrying luggage as children held the adults’ hands.
“We are dying. There is no food, no drink, no electricity, no medicine,” said Hanadi Dahoud, who was displaced from the southern city of Khan Younis. “We want to live. We just want to live. We are tired.”
The United Nations said the continuous forced movement of people was causing panic and uncertainty.
“People are treated like pinballs with constant military orders playing with their fate and lives,” said Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.
Netanyahu vows to implement Trump’s Gaza plan
Israel has vowed to intensify its military operations until Hamas releases the remaining 59 hostages it holds — 24 of them believed to be alive. Israel has also demanded that Hamas disarm and leave the territory, conditions that were not included in the ceasefire agreement and which Hamas has rejected.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that Israel would take charge of security in Gaza after the war and implement U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposal to resettle Gaza’s population in other countries, describing it as “voluntary emigration.”
That plan has been universally rejected by Palestinians, who view it as forcible expulsion from their homeland. Human rights experts say it would likely violate international law.
Hamas has insisted on implementing the signed agreement, which called for the remainder of the hostages to be released in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli pullout. Negotiations over those parts of the agreement were supposed to begin in February but only preliminary talks have been held.
Israeli military orders the evacuation of Gaza's southern city of Rafah
The Israeli military issued sweeping orders, indicating it could soon launch another major ground operation in the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip.
