Bloomberg Agency said that the Israeli army asked civilians to leave the eastern sector of Rafah, as a prelude to its attack on this city adjacent to the Egyptian border, and as part of its campaign that destroyed most of the besieged Gaza Strip and killed more than 35,000 Palestinians, most of whom were children and women.
The agency explained – in an article written by Dana Khraish – that a major attack in this region, which is home to more than a million displaced people, sparked criticism from the United States, Egypt and other countries that expressed their concern for civilians, but Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant says that there is no choice but for the army to begin an operation. Military in Rafah.
To clarify the circumstances of this attack, the agency answered the following four questions:
First: What is Rafah?
Rafah is a city located in the far south of the Gaza Strip, with a population of about 280 thousand people. It is located near the Gaza border with Egypt, which is 12 kilometers long. It is the location of the main crossing point between the two sides. Israel now besieges more than half of Gaza’s population, which is about 2.2 kilometers long. Million people, according to the United Nations.
The Rafah crossing was established mainly for pedestrians, but is now used to transport vital aid to Gaza, but the distribution of aid – according to the agency – is hampered by the ongoing hostilities, and some of it comes through the Kerem Shalom crossing, which connects Gaza to Israel.
Second: How is the situation in Rafah now?
Pictures show the city of Rafah filled with tents and makeshift homes in densely populated clusters as people face food and medicine shortages. The United Nations says “the scarcity of food, clean water, health services and sanitation facilities has led to avoidable illnesses and deaths” and describes Rafah as “a pressure cooker full of despair.” .
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned that a ground incursion into Rafah would pose “catastrophic risks to 600,000 children currently sheltering in this enclave.”
She added that people leaving Rafah face corridors that may be mined or filled with unexploded ordnance, in addition to the problem of shelter and limited services.
Third: What is the Israeli perspective?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes that it is “impossible” to achieve the goal of destroying the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) if Israel leaves what he says are the movement’s last brigades in Rafah, where the Israelis estimate that between 5,000 and 8,000 of them are holed up there.
According to Bloomberg, Netanyahu is trying to reconcile appeasing his far-right, pro-war partners at home, and cooperating with the United States, which helped the Israeli war effort but declares with other countries its opposition to a new incursion into Rafah without a plan to protect civilians.
The agency indicated that the decision to pursue Hamas in Rafah threatens, for the second time, to obstruct a deal that could lead to the normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, whose negotiations were halted by the outbreak of the Israeli war on Gaza.
Fourth: What is Egypt’s perspective?
An Israeli attack on Rafah raises Egypt’s fears that its effects will spread to its territory, fearing that Hamas fighters will enter across the border, “which may cause security problems,” and that the besieged civilians will follow suit, and then Israel will prevent them from returning to Gaza after that.
Tension had escalated between Israel and Cairo with the beginning of the war, especially after an Israeli research center suggested that Egypt open the Sinai Desert to displaced Palestinians.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and other officials ruled out any idea of transferring Gaza residents to Egypt, saying that such a move could pose a security threat and undermine Palestinian hopes of establishing their state.
