Israel moves in on north Gaza Hamas stronghold, pounds Rafah without advancing

CAIRO/ JERUSALEM:

Israel's tanks pushed into the heart of Jabalia in northern Gaza on Thursday, facing anti-tank rockets and mortar bombs from fighters concentrated there, while in the south, its forces pounded Rafah without advancing, Palestinian residents and fighters said.

The slow progress of Israel's offensive, more than seven months after it was prompted by Hamas' deadly cross-border raid, highlighted the difficulty of achieving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's aim of eradicating the resistance group.

Armed wings of Hamas and its ally Islamic Jihad have been able to fight up and down the Gaza Strip, using heavily fortified tunnels to stage attacks in both the north - the focus of Israel's initial invasion - and new battlegrounds like Rafah.

"We are wearing Hamas down," Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said, announcing that more troops would be deployed in Rafah, where he said several tunnels had been destroyed.

Israel says four Hamas battalions are now in Rafah along with hostages abducted during the Oct. 7 assault, but faces pressure from the United States, Europe and the United Nations not to invade the city, where hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinian civilians are sheltering.

Read also: Israeli tanks push deeper into Rafah, battles rage in northern Gaza

The Gaza death toll has risen to 35,272, health officials in the Hamas-run coastal enclave said, and malnutrition is widespread as international aid efforts are blocked by the violence and Israel's de-facto shutdowns of its Kerem Shalom crossing and the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.

Israel says Hamas is diverting aid and it needs to eliminate the organisation for its own protection after the deaths of 1,200 people on Oct. 7, and to free the 128 hostages still held out of 253 abducted by the fighters, according to its tallies.

The United States anchored a temporary floating pier to a beach in Gaza on Thursday to boost aid deliveries, but it was still unclear how it would be distributed given the challenges that have beset the United Nations and relief groups for months.

Egyptian sources said Cairo, which fears a mass exodus from Gaza to Egypt, had rejected an Israeli request to coordinate on the reopening of the Rafah border crossing, which Israel seized on May 7, and keep it beyond Palestinian control.

Ceasefire and hostage release talks are deadlocked over how to end the war. Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh said his group, which has run Gaza since 2007, should continue to have a role while President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, mediating along with Qatar and the United States, said Israel was not doing enough.

Main market in Jabalia under fire, residents say

Israel declared major operations over in northern Gaza months ago while pledging to return to prevent Hamas regrouping.

On Thursday, around a week after they moved back in, Israeli tanks were heavily bombarding the main market in the heart of Jabalia, a decades-old refugee camp, and several stores there caught fire, residents and Hamas media outlets said.

Earlier, the armed wing of Hamas said its fighters in Jabalia had destroyed an Israeli troop carrier with a locally-made Al-Yassin 105 anti-tank rocket, causing casualties. Reuters was not immediately able to verify the statement and there was no immediate comment from Israel.

"They are bombing like crazy, destroying the houses and the main market in the camp," one of the camp's residents told Reuters via a chat app.

"It seems they are acting this way because of the resistance operations that grilled their soldiers," he added, refusing to give a name for fear of reprisals.

An Israeli tank manoeuvres near the Israel-Gaza border in Israel, May 16, 2024. PHOTO: REUTERS

Residents said tanks had also pushed back to near the entrance to the nearby northern city of Beit Hanoun and Israeli bulldozers were demolishing factories and property in the area.

Palestinian medical teams said they were aware of reports of casualties in Jabalia but were unable to reach them because of the intensity of Israeli bombing and the active army incursion.

Among those killed were a Palestinian journalist, Mahmoud Jahjouh, and his family, medics and fellow journalists said.

Israeli says it has eliminated many gunmen in Jabalia but had no new comment on developments there on Thursday.

Read: Israel offensive on Rafah would not eliminate Hamas, says Blinken

In Gaza City to the south, medical teams and rescuers said they were continuing the search for casualties in the Zeitoun and Sabra suburbs after dozens of bodies were recovered in the wake of a six-day army raid. Palestinian authorities do not distinguish between fighters and civilians when reporting death tolls.

In the southern tip of Gaza, tanks held their positions in eastern neighbourhoods and outskirts of Rafah while keeping up pressure with aerial and ground bombardments.

Medics said one Israeli tank shell had landed in a square deep inside Rafah, killing one Palestinian and wounding several others, while residents said clusters of homes on the edge of the city had been blown up by the army after evacuation orders.

Israel said its strikes were targeted at fighters.

"We're operating in specific places according to our intelligence and where we know Hamas terrorists are hiding, and where we think we can find either tunnel shafts or terror infrastructure or ammunition of many types," military spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani said.