The eviction of Ciudad de Gaza is “inevitable.” This was stated on Wednesday the Israeli army spokesman in Arabic, Avichay Adraee, in a statement in which it is urgent to move to the south to the million civilians that the United Nations estimates that they are in the capital of the strip. The military note is the last of many, which now underlines its message towards the civilian population with colossal bombings against the area while the tanks advance on the ground.
The spokesman has extended the notice to the whole of the Palestinians who are “in the north” of the enclave, which includes several more urban nuclei. He has also assured that in the south there is space to establish themselves and that those who go there will receive abundant humanitarian aid, adding that Israel is mobilizing the arrival of tents. One of the areas that Adraee raises in the statement is to the Mawasi ,.
On Tuesday, the Israeli security cabinet avoided, during a meeting that was anticipated relevant, discuss the proposal of high temporary fire on the table and that. The absence of an agreement encourages the continuation of the Israeli plans, which plan to take control of Ciudad de Gaza. Before, they must expel the crowds that are concentrated in the area from the territory, mostly in improvised camps that have emerged between the rubble.
For months, Israeli troops concentrate the Gazati population in a diminishing territory along the Mediterranean coast that does not exceed 14% of the territory of the strip, according to calculations of the UN agencies. The rest is directly occupied by the troops or declared by Israel as a combat zone. Now, the assault against Gaza City will reduce the available space and increase the population concentration even more.
The mayor of Deir al Balah – in the center of the strip -, Nizar Ayash, has reacted to the Israeli statement with skepticism: “The coast is overpopulated, and the part to the east is a red zone under bombing,” he said in statements to a Palestinian media. The UN Office for Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) recently declared El País that there is no additional space, that tents are taking advantage of until the last meter of land and that soon “people will have to enter the sea.”
Jake Laerke, spokesman for that organization, denounced last week the blockade that Israel imposed on the strip five months ago and that prevents the sending of tents and other supplies linked to the shelter. In this period, more than 700,000 people from the place where they tried to survive, already in the middle of a devastated territory. “They may have provided a tent, but then they are displaced again, without the possibility of taking it with him,” he said in a press conference in Geneva.
“We hear the tanks advancing”
Israeli bombings persist on some of the main districts of Ciudad de Gaza, such as Zeitún, Shejala or Sabra, as Reuters has broadcast on Wednesday, citing Palestinian civilians on the ground. The same sources have reported the progress of the tanks towards new territories. “Suddenly, we hear the tanks advancing towards [el barrio] Ibad Al Rahman. The sound of explosions became stronger and stronger, and we saw people fleeing towards our area. ”
“The tanks move towards us,” said a Palestinian child in a video broadcast by local activists from the neighborhood. The boy, who is the one who holds the camera, records himself and also shows what is distinguished through what was once a window from within a partially destroyed building. Shots are heard. “There are,” he says with his head, closing his eyes with each rumble.
The Ministry of Health of Gaza, controlled by Hamas, said Wednesday that Israeli military actions have caused 76 dead and 298 injured in 24 hours. He has also notified the death of 10 more people for starvation, raising to 313 victims for that cause.
Since March 18, when Israel unilaterally liquidated a high fire agreement that released hostages gradually and allowed the entry of humanitarian aid in the enclave, the Israeli army has directly killed more than 11,000 people in the enclave, according to data from the Gazatí Ministry. The total figure from the attacks of October 7, 2023 rises 62,895 victims.
