Israel tanks approach Gaza City
Israeli tanks and infantry have advanced on Gaza City from two directions, with tanks reported to be on the main north-south road, in an apparent effort to cut the strip into two.
Reports in the Hebrew media, statements from Hamas and Palestinian witness accounts, described Israeli armour operating close to the Mediterranean coast in the north of Gaza in an area where Hamas said it was engaged in heavy fighting.
Witnesses said Israeli tanks had advanced to cut the main north-south Salah al-Din road south of Gaza City and were operating on the outskirts of the Zaytun district and Shejaiya neighbourhood of Gaza City.
Video taken by a local journalist was said to show an Israeli tank and bulldozer in central Gaza blocking the main highway and firing on a car, which was seen exploding.
Meanwhile, Israel said it had rescued a female soldier kidnapped during Hamas’s 7 October massacre in southern Israel.
The soldier was named as Ori Megidish, a private who serves as a border observer, who was rescued overnight on Monday in undisclosed circumstances. She was described as in good health following a reunion with her family.
Megidish’s release came as Hamas released a video showing three female hostages appealing to be swapped for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
The women were later identified in Israeli media as Elena Trupanov, Danielle Aloni and Rimon Kirsht, who had been kidnapped from border communities.
Responding to the Hamas video, in which one of the hostages addresses an angry message to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister condemned it as “cruel psychological propaganda”.
Describing an increased tempo of urban fighting, the Israel Defence Forces spokesperson R Adm Daniel Hagari said Israeli troops were involved in fighting with armed Palestinian factions holed up in buildings.
“Overnight, troops eliminated dozens of terrorists who barricaded themselves in the buildings and tried to attack the forces that were moving in their direction,” he said, adding that fighting was continuing.
In one incident, the Israeli military said a fighter jet had targeted a building “with over 20 Hamas terrorist operatives inside”, while another fighter jet was guided to an anti-tank missile launching post in the area of al-Azhar University, it said. The university is in the heart of Gaza City.
The military also said it had hit “weapons depots, dozens of anti-tank missile launching positions, as well as hideouts and staging grounds used by the Hamas terrorist organisation”.
The escalating assault came amid increasing questions in Israel and among its international backers over what end game Israel envisaged for Gaza amid only vaguely articulated war aims.
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I think Israel's stated war aims are pretty specific. They want to destroy Hamas and its ability to threaten Israelis. They are targeting Hamas's leadership and its fighters. They are reducing many of Gaza buildings to rubble. It is likely the car that exploded when the tank fired on it was booby-trapped. Israeli intelligence appears to be able to designate weapon storage facilities and also quickly respond to buildings where Hamas fighters are located.
See, also:
Israel expands ground campaign in Gaza, as fears of widening regional war rise
Strikes inside Syria and Iran-backed attacks on U.S. forces spark new unease
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Fears of a widening regional conflict continued to grow. Israeli forces carried out airstrikes against military infrastructure in Syria, where rockets were launched into open Israeli territory. Israeli troops and Hezbollah operatives clashed on the border with Lebanon.
The brunt of the war is in Gaza. United Nations officials and local medical personnel said Monday that Israeli airstrikes were too close to hospitals in and around Gaza City. Thousands of Palestinians are seeking shelter among the wounded in hospitals and in badly overcrowded schools across Gaza.
Israeli officials say their focus is on killing Hamas fighters and destroying the group’s infrastructure in Gaza but warn that the militants have repeatedly employed “human shields.” They hide and operate among civilians in a manner that increases the risk of casualties.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed in a media briefing Monday that the Israeli offensive would not let up. He brushed off calls to delay or scrub the operation to protect millions of Palestinian civilians trapped inside Gaza.
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“In the last day, about 600 targets were attacked, including warehouses, hiding places and gatherings of Hamas operatives and anti-tank positions,” the IDF said in a sobering assessment.
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Nonetheless, the international community attempted to moderate Hamas' behavior by offering economic incentives. Billions of dollars in donations, supplies, and building materials from Europe, Qatar, the United Nations, and other donors have come pouring into the Gaza Strip.
But here is the dirty little secret: economic incentives cannot change a genocidal, jihadi, terror group.
The aid money and materials designed for civilian infrastructure have never benefited the people of Gaza. They have been, time and again, stolen from Gazans by Hamas, whether for the salaries of Hamas leaders or for terror tunnels and rocket manufacturing facilities throughout the strip.
These facilities and their launchers are found in and under hospitals, schools, mosques and residential buildings, turning the people of Gaza into human shields for the terrorists.
While Israel seeks to mitigate civilian casualties in its military operations, Hamas seeks to increase civilian casualties – of both Israelis and Palestinians. How else can one rationally explain indiscriminately firing rockets at a civilian population from locations embedded within a civilian population?
The people of Gaza, after voting for Hamas, live within a terror war machine and sadly, we must recognize that they continue to support Hamas and its atrocities.
And Iran, the No. 1 global state sponsor of terror which funds much of Hamas' terror budget, provides a lifeline of support.
The immoral and false comparisons between Israel, a law-abiding democracy, and Hamas, an internationally designated terror group, that we are seeing at the UN and in the media now is exactly what the terrorists want.
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And:
Iranian proxies continue attacks against US troops in Middle East following US strikes
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From Oct. 17 to Oct. 30, U.S. and coalition forces have been attacked at least 14 times at al Asad Air Base in Iraq and nine times at al Tanf garrison in Syria via a mix of one-way attack drones and rockets for a total of 23 attacks to date, a senior defense official told reporters on Monday. The total demonstrated an increase from late last week.
"Many of these attacks were successfully disrupted by our military," the official said. "Most failed to reach their targets thanks to our robust defenses."
The U.S. military in eastern Syria targeted two facilities used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps last Thursday.
“The President has no higher priority than the safety of U.S. personnel, and he directed today’s action to make clear that the United States will not tolerate such attacks and will defend itself, its personnel, and its interests,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a statement.
One of the facilities the U.S. targeted was a "weapons storage area," while the other was "an ammunition storage area," according to a senior military official.
Twenty-one U.S. service members were injured, albeit not severely, at the two air bases between Oct. 17 and Oct. 18. A U.S. contractor died after suffering cardiac arrest when an early warning system detected another possible threat, leading to people scrambling for shelter.
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At some point, Iran is likely to be targeted by Israel and the US. Israel has called Iran "the head of the snake" for the attacks by Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran is likely behind the attacks on US forces in the region.
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