Netanyahu Orders Army to Prepare Reserves
For Ground Offensive in Rafah
Said Amori / AA News Broadcasting System
JERUSALEM (February 10, 2024) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday asked the Israeli army to remobilize reserve soldiers in preparation for a ground offensive in the city of Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, the Israeli media reported.
According to Channel 13, Chief of General Staff Herzi Halevi said: “The army will be able to handle any mission, but there are political aspects that must be addressed first.”
A senior Israeli official, who preferred not to be named, told the channel: “The operation in Rafah is approaching.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday ordered the military to submit a dual plan to evacuate Palestinian residents from Rafah, home to more than 1 million residents seeking refuge from war, and to defeat the remaining “Hamas battalions.”
The Palestinians have sought refuge in Rafah as Israel pounded the rest of the enclave following the Oct. 7 Hamas incursion. The bombardment has killed more than 28,000 people, besides causing mass destruction and shortages of basic necessities.
The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave’s infrastructure was damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.
Netanyahu’s Rafah Offensive
Could Lead to a World War 3
Steven Starr / Special to EAW
(February 10, 2024) — Rafah is the town that borders Egypt and the Sinai desert, where one million Palestinian refugees have fled to escape the merciless Israeli attacks against them. More than 100,000 Palestinian civilians, including 70,000 Palestinian women and children, have already been killed and wounded. Most of these poor refugees are literally starving to death because of the 3-month long Israeli blockade of water, food, electricity, and medicine to Gaza.
If Israel launches this attack on Rafah, with the aim of driving one million Palestinians into the desert — and killing all those who refuse to leave — I expect a regional war will result, one which could conceivably become a World War.
Biden could prevent this with a single phone call. If the US cut off all military and financial aid to Israel, the Israelis could not continue to prosecute its genocidal ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians from Gaza. However, just the opposite seems to be happening, with the full support and complicity of the United States.
Posted in accordance with Title 17, Section 107, US Code, for noncommercial, educational purposes.
