Hind Rajab’s death shows defencelessness of Palestinians in Gaza
Political commentator Nour Odeh says the deaths of Hind Rajab and two paramedics are evidence of how “brutal” the continuing war is.
Rajab, a six-year-old Palestinian girl who had been missing for 12 days after an Israeli tank targeted her family’s car in Gaza, was found along with the bodies of two medics dispatched to look for them. “It brings into very sharp focus … how defenceless these civilians are, and how impossible the work of paramedics and first responders, and doctors is,” she told Al Jazeera.
“We’ve seen the killing of dozens of paramedics, first responders, and doctors over the past four months,” she added. “Some of them were shot inside hospital compounds, in addition to patients.” Odeh said Rajab’s death should be a wake-up call for the international community.
“The question is, will we see countries spring to action? We saw them spring to action to defund the one organisation [UNRWA] that is able to help and provide humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza on no evidence,” she added. “And yet all of this insurmountable evidence and the ICJ order saying that Israel must stop any genocidal acts, yet we see very little in the way of action by states that can make a difference.”
Netanyahu wants to re-mobilise Israeli army reservists for Rafah operation
The Israeli prime minister urged Israeli army chief of staff Herzi Halevi to recruit again reservists who had been released from military service, Israeli broadcaster Channel 13 reports. Halevi’s response, according to the report, was to tell Netanyahu that the army can handle any task.
Channel 13 goes on to say, citing a “senior Israeli official”, that the army’s Rafah operation is getting closer to starting, but that coordination with the Egyptians has not yet been achieved.
Israel’s Rafah operation will take months and will not destroy Hamas
Mamoun Abu Nowar, a retired general of the Jordanian air force, tells Al Jazeera that Hamas’s forces in Rafah are quite formidable. “The southern part of Gaza is one of [Hamas’s] command posts, as they call them,” he said. “There are strategic tunnels, they go deep, like 60 metres or so [about 200 feet], and the tactical tunnels, which are like 20, 43 metres [66, 141 feet].” “In order to control these tunnels,” he continued, “they have to work very hard, to cut these command posts or destroy them so [Hamas] loses this command as a whole, but this would be a very very difficult fight, it would take months.”
Israel’s plan, in Nowar’s opinion, is to begin by forcing Palestinians in the city, many of whom have been displaced multiple times since the beginning of the war, to leave Rafah and move towards the coast, before launching its attacks. He said this would be a disaster for the civilian population in Rafah, and that Israel would be the “master of genocide” should it follow through with its plans to storm Rafah, which will bring them no closer to their goal of eliminating Hamas.
“This is an endless war, and Hamas will still be there, and the Israelis will not win it,” he said.
