Israel has carried out air strikes in southern Gaza’s Rafah, killing dozens, according to health officials, as Palestinians brace for a major offensive on the densely crowded city.There were conflicting reports of the death toll following the predawn strikes on Monday.
The AFP news agency reported that the strikes killed 52 people, while Reuters reported that 37 had been killed. Both outlets quoted health officials in Gaza.
The Israeli strikes hit 14 houses and three mosques in Rafah, according to Palestinian officials.
However, Al Jazeera Arabic colleagues have reported that at least 63 people were killed in the strikes on the mosques. A press statement from Hamas asserted that more than 100 had been killed in the city.
Israel’s military said it had struck a number of “terror targets” in the Shaboura district of Rafah and the strikes had concluded.
Israel’s military also said it had rescued two captives taken by Hamas in an overnight operation in Rafah.
Military officials said the captives, named as Fernando Simon Marman and Louis Har, were in good condition.
Hamas has warned that an Israeli ground assault in Rafah would “blow up” negotiations to release the group’s remaining captives in Gaza.
The strikes on Rafah come as Israel is preparing to launch a major offensive that aid agencies fear would result in significant civilian casualties in the last relatively safe area of Gaza.
US political scientist Stephen Walt says Israel has changed over the years, but Biden’s policy is stuck in the past.
The United States’ support for Israel’s war on Gaza makes the country look ineffectual and hypocritical to the rest of the world, according to Harvard University professor Stephen Walt, co-author of The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy.
Walt tells host Steve Clemons that Israel and the US-Israel relationship have changed over the decades, but US President Joe Biden is holding on to a view of Israel formed in the West in the 1970s.
By rejecting a ceasefire, the US looks like it “encourages conflict” instead of being a peacemaker, Walt argues, especially since Israel has no political strategy for resolving the Palestinian question.
