Israel Hamas War Updates: Smoke rises following Israeli strikes in Gaza.
Israel’s military pounded the Palestinian enclave of Gaza on Sunday and killed hundreds of people a day after a surprise attack by Hamas group left over 600 Israelis dead, the worst attack on Israeli soil in decades.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked the nation to prepare themselves for a “long and difficult” war a day after Hamas fired a barrage of thousands of rockets at Israel and sent a wave of fighters who gunned down civilians and took at least 100 hostages.
Israel was stunned when Hamas launched their multi-pronged offensive on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, with at least 3,000 rockets raining down as fighters infiltrated towns and kibbutz communities and stormed an outdoor rave where many revellers were shot dead.
Panicked Israelis hiding in their homes told reporters that militants were going door to door and shooting civilians or dragging them away.
Here are the Updates on the Israel-Hamas Conflict:
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Oil prices soared more than four percent Monday after Hamas launched an attack on Israel at the weekend, sparking concerns about possible supply shocks from the crude-rich region.
Brent jumped 4.7 percent to $86.65 and West Texas Intermediate was up 4.5 percent at $88.39 in early Asian business.
Major airlines cancelled dozens of flights to Tel Aviv this weekend after the Palestinian militant group Hamas launched a surprise attack against Israel.
American Airlines, Air France, Lufthansa, Emirates and Ryanair are among those pulling flights to Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport.
However, airport authorities did not stop commercial air links with Israel’s second international airport at Eilat, a tourist destination on the Red Sea.
And Israeli flag carrier El Al said Sunday that it was maintaining its Tel Aviv flights for now, though some flights operated by foreign partners had been cancelled.
El Al said it was operating “in accordance with the instructions of the Israeli security forces”, with all flights now departing only from Terminal Three at Ben Gurion.
Like most other airlines, it said clients could change their tickets without charge.
Israel-Gaza violence is escalating by the day with rockets piercing the skies into each other territories and shootouts between security forces and Hamas group of Palestine. Over 1,100 have been killed on both sides since Hamas launched its attack on Saturday.
“This is our 9/11 and more,” the Israel Army’s spokesperson said, adding Hamas wanted “an annihilation of our State”.
The US is moving its ships closer to Israel in a show of support and boosting fighter jet squadrons in the eastern Mediterranean.
Several American citizens were killed in the surprise land-sea-air attack on Israel by the Palestine group Hamas, a US official confirmed on Sunday. The official did not provide any further details, such as the exact number of Americans killed or their identities.
“We can confirm the deaths of several US citizens,” a spokesperson for the US National Security Council said, as quoted by news agency AFP. “We extend our deepest condolences to the victims and to the families of all those affected.”
US President Joe Biden ordered the deployment of US ships and warplanes to Israel on Sunday, signaling Washington’s “unwavering” support for its ally in the face of escalating attacks by Hamas.
As Israel reeled from a deadly attack by Hamas militants who broke through barriers around Gaza and roamed at will, killing scores of civilians in Israeli towns, defence chiefs faced growing questions over how the disaster could have happened.
A day after the 50th anniversary of the start of the 1973 Yom Kippur war, when Israeli forces were caught off guard by Syrian and Egyptian tank columns, the military appeared once again to have been surprised by a sudden attack.
“It looks quite similar to what happened at that time,” said retired General Giora Eiland, a former head of Israel’s National Security Council. “As we can see it, Israel was completely surprised, by a very well coordinated attack,” he told a briefing with reporters.
An army spokesman said there would be discussions on the intelligence preparation “down the road” but for the moment the focus was on fighting. “We’ll talk about that when we need to talk about it,” he told a briefing with reporters.
- A surprise attack by Hamas on Israel, which combined gunmen breaching security barriers with a barrage of rockets fired from Gaza, was launched on Saturday during the Jewish high holiday of Simchat Torah.
- The attack came 50 years and a day after Egyptian and Syrian forces launched an assault during the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur in an effort to retrieve territory Israel had taken during a brief conflict in 1967.