Israel continues strikes despite pressure to protect civilians – L’Express

The Israeli army is bombing the Gaza Strip this Sunday, December 3, despite international calls for restraint in order to protect civilians, and against a backdrop of “impasse” to renew the truce with Hamas.

⇒ The Israeli army continues its strikes in the Gaza Strip this Sunday

⇒ The war will continue “until all objectives are achieved”, declared Benjamin Netanyahu

⇒ Kamala Harris believes that “Israel must do more to protect innocent civilians” in Gaza

Since the resumption of fighting on Friday, the Israeli army says it has struck “more than 400 targets” in the Gaza Strip. It also recorded “more than 250 rockets” fired by the armed branches of Hamas and Islamic Jihad and announced the death of two soldiers on Saturday.

This Sunday, December 3, at dawn, a strike left at least seven dead in the Rafah sector, at the southern tip of the Gaza Strip, near the border with Egypt, the Hamas government said. Deployed on the ground in the north of the Gaza Strip, the IDF has increased airstrikes in the south of this territory, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been displaced by the conflict.

“By expanding our military operations, we accomplish two goals. First, we strike Hamas, we eliminate more terrorists, more commanders, more terrorist infrastructure, more tunnels […] and we are creating the conditions to force (Hamas) to pay a heavy price: the release of the hostages,” said Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. “There is no other way to win than by continuing our land campaign”, added Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The war will continue until “all objectives are achieved”, and in particular the destruction of the Palestinian Islamist movement, he affirmed on Saturday evening.

Without calling into question the right of its ally “to defend itself” against Hamas, the United States warned Israel against a growing death toll in the Gaza Strip. “Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed. Frankly, the extent of the suffering and the images and videos coming to us from Gaza are devastating,” declared American Vice President Kamala Harris from COP28 in Dubai. He added: “Israel must do more to protect innocent civilians.”

Statements confirmed by the American Minister of Defense, Lloyd Austin. The former army general, who notably fought in Iraq and Afghanistan and led the fight against the Islamic State (IS) group, explained during a speech at the National Defense Forum of Reagan Institute, in California, that he had learned “a thing or two about urban combat.” “The lesson to learn is not that you are guaranteed to win an urban war if you protect civilians. The lesson is that you can only win an urban war if you protect civilians “, he stressed. “In this type of combat, the center of gravity is the civilian population. And if you push it into the arms of the enemy, you replace a tactical victory with a strategic defeat,” he added, believing that “like Hamas, ISIS was deeply established in urban areas”.

A few hours earlier, since COP28, Emmanuel Macron had also asked himself: “The total destruction of Hamas, what is it and does anyone think it is possible? If that’s it, the war will last 10 years. And I believe that no one knows how to seriously define this objective, so this objective must be clarified.” The French president estimated that Israel’s “security” cannot be guaranteed if it “comes at the cost of Palestinian lives.”

In Israel, hundreds of people demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Saturday to demand the release of the 137 people still detained in the Gaza Strip. Many carried posters with photos of the captives. Four ex-hostages spoke to the crowd via video broadcast to recount their fear, hunger and lack of sleep during their captivity. “Our daughters saw things that children of this age, or of any age, should not see,” said Danielle Aloni, 45, released on November 24 with her five-year-old daughter.

Elena Trupanov, released on Wednesday and who was at the Tel Aviv rally, pleaded: “we must bring back my Sasha and the rest” of the detainees, she said, referring to her son, still a prisoner. In the evening, the Israeli coordinator for the hostages Gal Hirsch met the American special envoy on this issue, Roger Carstens, “efforts to free the hostages” were being made, the Israeli authorities indicated without elaborating.