2023-12-26 16:29:02
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced an increase in military operations against Hamas and at the same time named three preconditions for an end to the fighting: the Islamist Hamas must be destroyed, the Gaza Strip must be “demilitarized” and Palestinian society must be “deradicalized.” Meanwhile, fighting in the Gaza Strip continued on Tuesday. Austria announced further aid for the suffering Palestinian civilian population.
Specifically, five million euros would be made available for “the vital work of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the United Nations World Food Program (WFP),” the Foreign Ministry (BMEIA) announced in a broadcast on Tuesday. The majority of the population in Gaza is currently dependent on aid deliveries, it said. The ICRC and WFP would continue to have access to the Gaza Strip and could provide assistance directly on site despite extremely difficult conditions. In addition, these proven collaborations ensure “that the aid from Austria actually benefits the people in Gaza and is not diverted or misused by the terrorist organization Hamas or other terrorist organizations.”
Since the beginning of the war in Gaza, triggered by the brutal terrorist attacks by Hamas in October 2023, there has been a dramatic deterioration in the living conditions of the civilian population, and there is even a threat of an acute hunger crisis, the broadcast stated. Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg (ÖVP) emphasized the urgency of helping the people in Gaza. “I am deeply affected by the situation in Gaza.”
Meanwhile, the Israeli army continued its bombardment of targets in the Gaza Strip, according to reports from international news agencies. The army announced on Tuesday morning that dozens of combat aircraft, in conjunction with ground troops, had once again attacked more than 100 targets. Among other things, tunnel shafts belonging to the Islamist Hamas and military installations were attacked. During the night, a terrorist cell in Jabalia that tried to plant explosives near an Israeli tank was eliminated. The troops fought the terrorists. A fighter plane then killed her. Hamas terrorists were also killed the day before in the southern city of Khan Younis. The military’s information could not initially be independently verified.
The Hamas health authority said a total of 52 dead were taken to hospitals in Rafah, Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah. The hospitals in the Gaza Strip, which are still working despite more than eleven weeks of war with Israeli air strikes and the deployment of ground troops, are very overloaded. An employee of the UN emergency relief office OCHA reported shocking scenes in a hospital in the Gaza Strip. “What I saw at Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah was absolute bloodbath,” Gemma Connell told the BBC. There are many injured people with “extremely serious wounds that cannot be treated because there are so many people ahead of them in line for an operation and the hospital is completely overloaded.” She was quoted as saying on Tuesday that she had to watch “how a nine-year-old boy died with a devastating head injury.”
There are currently no signs of the conflicting parties giving in. After reports of a plan by Egypt to end the war, the Islamist Hamas recently rejected a temporary ceasefire and demanded a permanent ceasefire. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced an increase in military operations and spoke of a long war.
In a guest article for the “Wall Street Journal” (Tuesday), he named three conditions for peace: “Hamas must be destroyed, the Gaza Strip must be demilitarized and Palestinian society must be de-radicalized. These are the three conditions for peace between Israel and its Palestinian neighbors in the Gaza Strip.” Netanyahu rejected international criticism. Israel “continues to act in full accordance with international law.” Israel is doing its best to keep the number of civilian casualties “as low as possible.”
The UN human rights office is extremely concerned about the continued Israeli bombings in the central Gaza Strip, according to a spokesman. Since Christmas Eve, 137 people have died in two refugee camps alone, the office said on Tuesday, citing information from the organization Doctors Without Borders. More than 50 airstrikes were reportedly carried out on December 24 and 25. According to these reports, three refugee camps were hit. All roads between the camps have been destroyed, making the supply of relief goods significantly more difficult. The supply situation was already catastrophic beforehand.
According to the Israeli army, a church in northern Israel was hit by an anti-tank missile in an attack from Lebanon. A civilian was also injured in the town of Ikrit, the statement said on Tuesday. According to media reports, it is the approximately 80-year-old guardian of the holy site. Meanwhile, Hezbollah and the Israeli army again fired at each other in the border area between Israel and Lebanon on Tuesday. According to the military, nine Israeli soldiers were injured.
The war was triggered by the terrorist attack by Hamas and other extremist groups on October 7th in Israel near the border with Gaza. They killed more than 1,200 people. Israel responded with massive airstrikes and a ground offensive that has so far killed more than 20,600 people, according to the Hamas-controlled health authority.
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