Monday 20 November 2023

West Bank the next target of Israel

Having nothing to claim a victory six weeks on, the Israelis are now being forced to move towards the south, in particular, the city of Khan Younis to try their luck there.

The regime has already forced Gazans to move from the north to the south. The Israeli military is now trying to squeeze them, if it can, into an even tighter area, closer to the Mediterranean coast.

This will create all types of problems in particular on a humanitarian scale, which is already at an extremely dire level. 

It will be a much more complicated battle for the Israeli ground forces if they try and go into the now even more densely populated areas of Khan Younis.

The regime is already paving the way for this ground offensive in the south by pounding the area from the air at the expense of innocent lives to make space for the ground forces to move in. 

The Israeli war on Gaza was primarily motivated by anger at a huge intelligence and military failure following the retaliatory al-Aqsa Storm operation by Hamas on October 07. 

There was indeed an immediate political imperative by the regime to do something and get on with it, rather than developing clear military objectives. 

After weeks of indiscriminate bombing campaigns against Palestinian civilians, the Israeli ground forces tried to invade the northern Gaza Strip. 

But the ground offensives in the north of Gaza have made no success, with Israeli commentators admitting so in talks with the regime’s media. 

After the ground offensives began in the north, the Israeli military's stated aims were to seize Gaza City, destroy Hamas, and free the hostages. 

The armed wings of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have prevented the Israeli military from achieving any of its stated objectives. 

In terms of trying to achieve the goals the occupation allegedly set out, which is to eliminate the Palestinian resistance group, but also free the hostages held in the captivity of Hamas, the Israeli military has failed miserably to do either of those two things after six weeks of unprecedented air raids and ground invasion. 

In particular, the notion that Hamas can be destroyed and the war cabinet of the Israeli prime minister has put that objective as the primary goal of its war on Gaza has proven to be wishful thinking.

The Palestinian resistance is as strong as it was on the first day of the war on Gaza some six weeks ago. 

The effectiveness of the Palestinian resistance in blowing up Israeli tanks, targeting the mobilization of its troops, luring Israeli forces into booby-trapped explosive buildings and firing missiles at Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories.

After six weeks of the war on Gaza it is evident that Hamas and other resistance factions remain powerfully strong. 

It has been a total failure for the Israeli occupation, which will go down in the history books for the stubbornness of Prime Minister Netanyahu as a war criminal. 

The only achievement thus far for the Israeli military has been the storming of the Al-Shifa hospital complex. A desperate attempt to find a Hamas military base that both Israeli political and military leaders alleged the group had been using as a command center. 

Yet it proved to be another huge intelligence failure, despite days of thoroughly inspecting every part of the hospital. 

As of Saturday, Israeli ground forces were still operating in the medical center with Palestinian health officials in Gaza saying that many patients, medical staff, and displaced people have now left the site. This is while medical centers must be protected under the rules of war. 

News outlets indicate that the Israeli military has ordered a mass evacuation of the entire hospital despite thousands of disabled and very sick patients unable to do so without dying. 

The hospital’s director, Mohammed Abu Salmiya, told AFP that Israeli troops had instructed him to ensure the evacuation of patients, wounded, the displaced and medical staff, and that they should move on foot towards the seafront".

It is another instance of war crime that the West has once again failed to hold the Zionist regime responsible for. 

The only achievement by the Israeli military is killing Palestinian civilians on a mass scale as well as killing its own hostages due to its indiscriminate bombing campaign that has leveled large parts of the Gaza Strip. 

This is nothing to be proud of and yet governments in the West, with the United States and the United Kingdom in particular, are not only complicit in the Israeli war crimes but continue to support the regime. This support for the Zionist regime is continuing despite the mass weekly demonstrations in the Western world protesting brutality against the Palestinians.

The Gaza Strip is a very tiny coastal sliver and is the most densely populated region in the world. It has been described by international rights organizations as the world's largest open-air prison. 

Six Palestinians were killed on Saturday after an Israeli airstrike on a house in Deir al Balah in the southern Gaza Strip, health officials said.

About 26 Palestinians, mostly children, were also killed in Israeli strikes on Khan Younis in southern Gaza early Saturday morning, the Palestinian news agency WAFA said. 

In what has been labeled as the "second phase" of the Israeli war on Gaza, experts believe it is difficult to imagine that the Israeli ground forces backed by the United States’ air power will be able to crush the resistance without killing thousands of more women and children. 

It is quite clear that Palestinian civilians are about to face another fresh bombardment after leaving the northern Gaza Strip to escape the indiscriminate Israeli bombing campaign. 

What is also clear is that children are already bearing the brunt of this increased bombing campaign in the southern Gaza Strip. 

Yet an Israeli military spokesperson has ordered Palestinians to continue going to southern Gaza. He said those in the areas of Jabayla, al-Daraj al-Tuffah and al-Shuja'iya should leave immediately along the Salah ad-Deen Highway - which runs the length of the fully blockaded Gaza Strip.

This is despite the increased bombardment in southern Gaza, where the Israeli ground forces are about to invade on top of the attacks in the north.

It is pure cowardice by the Israeli regime.

Its military is not taking on members of the Palestinian resistance man to man. Rather, the Israeli military has taken its anger out on Palestinian civilians. 

But where should traumatized Palestinian families in southern Gaza head to now? 

Their only viable option is the sea.

This is exactly what academics would describe as an Israeli genocide in Gaza.
 

 

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