Masses of Palestinians fled part of southeastern Gaza on Tuesday after Israel issued a warning to evacuate large parts of the towns of Khan Younis and Rafah and struck several targets in southern Gaza overnight.
Monday’s evacuation order and a heavy night of attacks came despite recent statements from Israeli commanders and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who pledged to scale down major ground operations and move to a lower-intensity phase of targeted attacks.
Israeli officials have said in recent days that they are close to ending the military offensive in the southern city of Rafah, which was seen as the last major ground maneuver of the war. But they have also said that the Israeli forces will continue to operate in Gaza in the near future to eradicate pockets of resistance and prevent Hamas from regaining control.
For many Gazans who have been forced to flee time and time again, the situation on the ground may not change much. Israeli forces have repeatedly returned to carry out days-long operations in neighborhoods they captured during the first offensive, in an effort to crack down on renewed uprisings by Palestinian militants.
The trigger for the evacuation orders and overnight Israeli attacks around Khan Younis appeared to be a barrage of about 20 rockets that the military said were fired by Palestinian militants from the area toward Israeli cities on Monday. Israeli forces hit back overnight after “enabling civilians to evacuate the area,” the army said.
The United Nations estimates that about 250,000 people would have to flee much of southern Gaza to comply with Israeli military orders. Scott Anderson, a senior U.N. official, said the calculation was based on pre-war population data and anecdotal observations about how many people had returned to the city.
Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN Secretary General, said an evacuation on such a scale would only increase the suffering of civilians facing food and water shortages. “People are faced with the impossible choice of having to move, some probably for the second or even third time, to areas where there is hardly any space or services, or to stay in areas where they know there will be heavy fighting.” , he says. said.
For Gaza residents, recent operations aimed at rooting out emerging groups of Hamas fighters have been far from low-intensity. According to the Israeli army, hundreds of Palestinian fighters have been killed during fighting in areas of northern Gaza such as Shajaiye, Jabaliya and Zeitoun. According to the United Nations, more than 60,000 people fled their homes in Jabaliya, returning to find widespread destruction.
Israeli forces largely withdrew from Khan Younis in April after months of fighting as they prepared to invade Rafah further south. In the relative peace that followed, many of the city’s residents returned home, some living in tents next to the rubble of their homes.
Suzan Abu Daqqa, 59, returned to her home on the southern edge of Khan Younis last month. It was relatively unscathed by the heavy Israeli bombardment that had destroyed large parts of the city, and there was still running water.
But on Monday evening, Ms Abu Daqqa and her family learned that the Israeli army had again ordered the evacuation of the city’s eastern suburbs. The now familiar sound of artillery fire began, she said, prompting her to flee northwest with family members.
Thousands of people filled the streets of the devastated city on Monday evening as they headed to the Mawasi area near the coast, which Israel has designated as a “safer zone.”
“How long can we continue to be told to leave and come back, leave and come back?” said Mrs. Abu Daqqa.
On Tuesday, residents of Khan Younis said most of the explosions they could hear seemed to occur further south, in Rafah, indicating that fighting in their city was less intense at least for now. However, the large-scale evacuation order could potentially herald a renewed military operation there.
Amir Avivi, a retired Israeli brigadier general, said Israeli forces would try to slowly wipe out remaining Hamas fighters in the area, a process he said could take years. Over time, Israel hopes to erode Hamas’s forces so thoroughly that Gaza will need fewer and fewer troops to control, he said.
“Every time the terrorists manage to regroup, there will be a raid to deal with them,” said General Avivi, who heads the hawkish Israel Defense and Security Forum. “These raids can last a few days or a week – usually no more than a few days – and then you withdraw.”
General Avivi said that for many Gazans it is likely to be very similar to the current Israeli military campaign in the north.
“It won’t feel any different, except maybe the deployment of the armed forces and the number of troops,” he said.
