The Israeli army fought fierce battles against Palestinian Hamas on Monday in Khan Younes, in the south of the Gaza Strip, as international pressure mounts on Israel to prepare an outcome to the war including the creation of a Palestinian state . Israel must accept a two-state solution to guarantee its security, EU foreign ministers, including Germany’s Annalena Baerbock, stressed on Monday before meeting separately in Brussels with their Israeli and Palestinian counterparts.
The main information:
- The Israeli army is engaged in fierce fighting in Khan Younes, in the south of the Gaza Strip.
- For the EU, Israel must accept a two-state solution to guarantee its security
- The French Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu met with his Israeli counterpart, before meeting Benjamin Netanyahu in Tel Aviv
“120 people” killed in the last 24 hours in Khan Younes, according to Hamas
On the ground in the morning, witnesses told AFP of heavy artillery fire, advances of Israeli tanks and violent clashes, near al-Aqsa University and Nasser Hospital in Khan Younes. According to Hamas, which accused the Israeli army of having targeted five structures housing 30,000 displaced people, “120 people” were killed in the area “during the last 24 hours”. The Israeli army announced that it had taken control of Hamas command posts in Khan Younes.
The conflict in brief
Entering its 108th day, the war was triggered by the unprecedented attack launched by the Palestinian Islamist movement on October 7 on Israeli soil, which resulted in the death of more than 1,140 people, mostly civilians, according to a count. from AFP based on official Israeli data. Some 250 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza, including around a hundred released at the end of November in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. According to the same count, 132 hostages are still in the territory, of whom 28 are believed to have died.
Israel has sworn to “annihilate” Hamas, which took power in the Gaza Strip in 2007. Its military operations there left 25,295 dead, the vast majority women, children and adolescents, according to a new report from Hamas.
In the courtyard of the Nasser hospital in Khan Younes, where Hamas officials are hiding, according to Israel, Gazans buried 40 bodies in a mass grave on Monday, according to AFPTV. “They dropped gas bombs on us, causing many people to suffocate,” describes Saadia Abou Taima. She drove her choking granddaughter to the hospital that night, but doctors couldn’t save her, she said.
Families flee the town of Khan Younes
At the end of the morning, the road to Rafah, further south, was stormed by families fleeing the city by all means, their belongings piled up in a hurry. Delivering its “version of the facts” on October 7 in an unprecedented communication operation, Hamas, classified as a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union, recognized on Sunday “errors” having caused the deaths of civilians, and demanded “an immediate end to Israeli aggression” in Gaza.
According to Wall Street Journal, American intelligence estimates that so far, Israel has killed “around 20% to 30%” of the fighters of this movement, far from its objective. According to this daily, the United States, Qatar and Egypt, already mediators of a truce in November, are trying to negotiate the release of the hostages in exchange for an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.
Relatives of the hostages, mobilized for their return, interrupted a meeting in the Israeli Parliament on Monday. During the night, families and supporters demonstrated near the official residence of the Israeli Prime Minister to demand an agreement on their release, as protests against the government intensify in Israel.
Lecornu spoke with his Israeli counterpart
But Benjamin Netanyahu “categorically” rejected Hamas’ “conditions” on Sunday, and remains deaf to the growing international calls for a humanitarian truce and a two-state settlement for the post-war period. “What are the other solutions,” the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, asked in Brussels, “make all the Palestinians leave? Kill them?”
In Tel Aviv, the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu, spoke with his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant, before a meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu. “A war in the north will be a challenge for Israel, but devastating for Hezbollah and Lebanon,” assured the Israeli Defense Minister during the interview. In the besieged Gaza Strip, where at least 1.7 of the 2.4 million inhabitants have had to flee their homes, many massing in the south, the humanitarian and health situation is catastrophic according to the UN.
The conflict is also exacerbating tensions between Israel and Hamas allies united by Iran within an “axis of resistance”, notably the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Yemeni Houthi rebels. On the Israeli-Lebanese border, where the Lebanese Islamist movement opened a second front against Israel, Israeli strikes hit several villages on Monday, according to the Lebanese National News Agency (NNA). Hezbollah claimed to have targeted Israeli troops during the night, preparing, according to it, an “assault on Lebanese territory”.