More from Gaza City
We have more testimonials from Gaza City, where Palestinians face renewed uncertainty and fear over Israel’s push to take over the city.
Samira Shahd struck a note of defiance, saying that she has been in a “displacement journey” for nearly two years now as a result of Israel’s bombardment. “Now we are here in Gaza City, which will be our last destination,” she told Al Jazeera.
“The Israelis have said they wanted to occupy Gaza and wanted us to go to southern Gaza. There is nothing in Gaza but tents, and we will never leave here. We don’t have any energy to move towards the south. We will stay here till we die here.”
Nader Abu Shahla said he will never be displaced again. “I had enough displacement and I had enough starvation,” he told Al Jazeera.
“Going to the south is useless. If the Israelis want to storm the tents, it’s OK, let them take our tents. My final decision is to stay here and die here.”
Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a house in Gaza City, August 8
Netanyahu ‘using military for a political end’
Rob Geist Pinfold, an international security lecturer at King’s College London, says there is “no military logic whatsoever” to Israel’s plan to take over Gaza City.
“Israel’s military are very much against this plan. They say that their soldiers are tired, they don’t have the resources available, this will endanger the hostages and captives that Hamas holds … in the Gaza Strip,” he told Al Jazeera.
“This is purely a political plan with political logic. It’s using the military for a political end.”
Geist Pinfold said that the political end is “to make Gaza even more unlivable” and more chaotic than it already is, and to displace all of the residents of the territory.
“It will force [Palestinians in Gaza] to live in the south of the territory, exacerbating the already dire humanitarian situation, which will then lead to one of two things,” he said.
“Either Gaza will become so uninhabitable that those Palestinians will leave en masse. Or, as Netanyahu alluded to in his remarks yesterday, the Arab states or unknown Arab powers step in and provide the governance for those Palestinians, but without imposing any conditions on Israel, like Israel committing to a Palestinian state.
“That’s Netanyahu’s long-term game here.”
