JERUSALEM/ AMMAN/ NEW YORK/ GAZA STRIP/WASHINGTON: Hundreds of injured residents and foreigners escaped Gaza to Egypt Wednesday, the first evacuations from the war-torn Palestinian territory pounded by Israeli warplanes in retaliation for an unprecedented Hamas attack.
The brief glimmer of hope sparked by the temporary opening of the Rafah border crossing was quickly snuffed out as a fresh strike pulverised buildings in Gaza’s biggest refugee camp for a second consecutive day, killing dozens according to the Palestinian health ministry.
AFP reporters at Gaza’s southern border saw ambulances whisking away the wounded to Egyptian field hospitals, including one young boy with heavy bandaging around his stomach. Whole families, struggling to carry their worldly possessions, rushed through the heavily fortified crossing towards Egypt, which said it admitted 335 foreigners or dual nationals and 76 seriously wounded and sick people.
AFPTV images from Wednesday’s strike on the Jabalia camp showed extensive damage and rescuers clawing through rubble to extract blood-stained casualties. Dozens were killed and wounded, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, which came a day after Israeli jets hit the camp, killing at least 47 people, according to an AFP count. Rescuers said “whole families” had died, but casualty details could not be immediately confirmed. Israel’s military did not comment.
The deadly Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip´s largest refugee camp “could amount to war crimes”, the UN Human Rights Office said. UN chief Antonio Guterres condemned Israel’s strikes on the Gaza refugee camp. “The secretary-general is appalled over the escalating violence in Gaza, including the killing of Palestinians, including women and children in Israeli air strikes in residential areas of the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp,” spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.
Israel’s Tuesday’s raid drew a chorus of international condemnation in the region and as far afield as Bolivia, which severed diplomatic ties in protest. Chile also decided to recall its ambassador “in the face of the unacceptable violations of international humanitarian law committed by Israel in the Gaza Strip. Colombian President Gustavo Petro also announced that he was recalling his country’s ambassador to Israel. Jordan recalled its ambassador to Israel “to condemn the Israeli war that is killing innocent people in Gaza”.
Hamas said seven of the 240 hostages it is holding, including three foreign passport holders, had died in Tuesday’s bombing, a claim impossible to verify. The group’s leader Ismail Haniyeh accused Israel of committing “barbaric massacres against unarmed civilians”, saying it was covering its own “defeats.”
Israel has relentlessly pounded Gaza in retribution for the worst attack in the country’s history, when Hamas gunmen stormed across the border, killing 1,400 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli officials. AFP reporters saw more tanks pour over the border into northern Gaza. Its bombing campaign has killed 8,796 people, according to Hamas-run Gaza’s health ministry. Israel said 15 soldiers died in ground fighting in Gaza on Tuesday, bringing to 330 the number killed since October 7. AFP images showed tearful Israeli women in uniform hugging each other for comfort at the funeral of one of the troops killed. At least four Palestinians were killed during Israeli raids in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said. The latest incident came as Palestinians declared a general strike across the territory, with shops shuttered in Ramallah. In the north, Israel has traded near-daily fire with Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah movement.
US President Joe Biden called for “urgent mechanisms” to dial down tensions and said top diplomat Antony Blinken would embark on another Middle East tour from Friday. President Joe Biden and Jordan’s King Abdullah II spoke and “discussed urgent mechanisms to stem violence, calm rhetoric and reduce regional tensions”, and also agreed it was “critical to ensure that Palestinians are not forcibly displaced outside of Gaza”, the White House said.
Saudi Arabia condemned Israeli bombing of Gaza’s largest refugee camp. Turkey and Iran called for a regional conference to prevent a conflagration. Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged Muslim countries to halt trade with Israel, including oil exports, and also lambasted Western governments who “stood against Palestine”, naming Britain, France and the United States.
The director of the New York office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has resigned in protest against Israel’s continuing war in Gaza, saying it was a “textbook case of genocide”. The US National Security spokesman John Kirby has said ‘Hamas can’t be the future of governance in Gaza’. We don’t have all the answers to that. But we are working with our partners in the region to explore what governance in Gaza can and should look like over the long term.“Whatever it is, it can’t be Hamas.”
