The Israel Defense Forces say that evacuation of residents and displaced people in eastern Rafah is “not a wide-scale evacuation of Rafah this is a limited-scale operation in the area of Eastern Rafah.”
Colonel Nadav Shoshani, IDF’s international spokesperson, said in a press briefing Monday they were “calling on people of Eastern Rafah to move north.”
When asked about how long residents would have to leave, Shoshani said,
“People have days at least to move,” he said when asked about how long residents would have to leave.
“As I said, we have. We’re having real-time situational assessments and assessing the situation,” Shoshani said.
When asked by CNN about what the operational reason for the move is, Shoshani said, “It’s part of our of our plans to dismantle Hamas, and as I said, we had a violent reminder of their presence and their operational abilities and welfare yesterday and as part of our plans to dismantle from us and to bring back our hostages.”
Shoshani would not be drawn about whether this evacuation was linked to an attack on IDF soldiers yesterday. “I don’t want to go into specific of our operational ideas and plans and timing,” he said.
Rafah concerns: Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant told troops Sunday morning in Gaza to expect “intense action in Rafah in the near future, and in other places all over the Strip,” because – as he put it — Hamas does not intend to reach an agreement on hostages and a ceasefire.
Aid agencies have been warning Israel about a full-scale ground invasion of Rafah
“Any ground operation would mean more suffering and death” for the 1.2 million displaced Palestinians sheltering in and around the Strip’s southernmost city, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs spokesperson Jens Laerke told journalists in Geneva.
Source link: https://www.cnn.com/middleeast/live-news/israel-hamas-war-gaza-news-05-06-24-intl-hnk/index.html