Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday visited Israeli defense forces outside the Gaza Strip, his office said in a statement. PM Netanyahu told the defense personnel, “You ready for the next stage? The next stage is coming.”
This comes as Israel announced a six hour evacuation window between 10am and 4pm on Saturday for Gaza civilians to move to Southern Gaza. triggering speculations of an impending ground attack.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said it received an order from Israeli forces earlier today with a deadline to evacuate its Al Quds hospital. It was later extended from the initial time of 6am today but the hospital could not be evacuated safely and it was obliged to continue caring for the sick and wounded, it said.
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Palestinians struggled Saturday to flee from areas of Gaza targeted by the Israeli military while grappling with a growing water crisis after Israel stopped the flow of resources to the region ahead of an expected land offensive a week after Hamas’ bloody, wide-ranging attack into Israel.
Israel renewed calls on social media and in leaflets dropped from the air for Gaza residents to move south, while Hamas urged people to stay in their homes.
Hamas also claimed that Israel has been bombing on people fleeing towards South Gaza.
The evacuation directive covers an area of 1.1 million residents, or about half of the territory’s population. The Israeli military said “hundreds of thousands” of Palestinians had already heeded the warning and headed south.
The Israeli military’s evacuation would force the territory’s entire population to cram into the southern half of the Gaza Strip as Israel continues strikes across the territory, including in the south.
The Gaza Health Ministry said Saturday that over 2,200 people have been killed in the territory, including 724 children and 458 women. The Hamas assault killed more than 1,300 people on the Israeli side, most of them civilians, and roughly 1,500 Hamas militants died were killed during the fighting, the Israeli government said.
(With inputs from AP)
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Updated: 14 Oct 2023, 08:44 PM IST