RAFAH — A ground offensive by the Israeli military on the packed city of Rafah, in the southernmost stretch of Gaza, has apparently become a matter of time. Will it be before or after the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which is due to start the second week of March.
Despite this, the international and Arab warnings appear to be rhetorical and lack any serious hope of stopping the further onslaught of war, killing, and destruction. Rather, they seemed to give the Israeli army the last chance to achieve the stated goals of the war: “absolute victory,” as Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu put it.
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There is only one condition: avoid harming civilians and reduce the number of dead and injured, according to the ever toothless “instructions” of the U.S. administration.
This approach of impunity is reinforced by the “liberation” by the Israeli army of two hostages, who were held in the second floor of a building in Rafah. The Israeli military said it moved to free them only “when conditions become appropriate to complete the rescue operation.”
Since the beginning of the war, Israel has established a set of goals, which it says aim at eliminating Hamas; de facto its real aim is to eliminate the Palestinians people in Gaza, by turning it into a territory unfit for human life.
The far-right politicians in Netanyahu’s government and the supporters of the return of settlement to Gaza continue their “genocidal rhetoric,” in a clear violation of the decisions of the International Court of Justice.
The war has entered its fifth month, and the Netanyahu government still asserts that Hamas and the movement’s leader, Yahya Sinwar, and his collaborators must be eliminated. But the Israeli military failed to find Sinwar after destroying Gaza City and Khan Younis, the largest and second largest cities in the strip.
Israel is now pushing for an offensive on Rafah, assuming that Sinwar and his aides are hiding in tunnels there. They also assume that the hostages are still alive and are likewise held in Rafah.
Lost humanity
The announcement that the Israeli military would invade Rafah has sent waves of panic among those trapped there. It seems that no country in the world is able to stop Israel, even measures ordered by the International Court of Justice didn’t stop it.
For many of Gaza’s people, the word humanity has no meaning. All now are asking: Why is Gaza being destroyed, and its people killed? And why does forced displacement continue?
Tents are piled up in shelter centers, with a scarcity of humanitarian aid
Israel’s war, they say, goes beyond revenge against Hamas. What is happening is a continued effort to commit “genocide” with the participation of major powers and the silence and helplessness of the rest of the world.
Rafah has become the largest concentration of displaced people in Gaza. Tents are piled up in shelter centers, with a scarcity of humanitarian aid and other necessities. The aid allowed in covers only 10% of the people’s needs.
“They have little to eat, hardly any access to medical care, nowhere to sleep, nowhere safe to go,” Martin Griffiths, the U.N. chief relief official, said in a statement on Tuesday. “Military operations in Rafah could lead to a slaughter in Gaza. They could also leave an already fragile humanitarian operation at death’s door.”
The local authority that survived relentless bombardments tries to organize and manage people’s daily affairs at all health and social levels. They register newborns and issue birth certificates and other official documents. But tallying the dead and issuing death certificates is taking up everyone’s time.
“To the moon?”
Rafah’s population has swelled to 1.4 million, adding to the burdens of the city’s civilian infrastructure, especially the healthcare system, which was one of the main targets of the Israeli operations.
Hospitals and morgues are no longer able to deal with the growing number of casualties. In the first two days of February, more than 550 dead were brought to the Abu Youssef al-Najjar Hospital, the government-run main medical facility in Rafah. That’s almost the same number of total annual deaths before the war: 600 in 2022, for example.
Patients of chronic diseases have faced major challenges. The Rafah hospitals are now overwhelmed with war wounded and patients who were displaced from elsewhere in the strip.
The Abu Youssef al-Najjar used to provide dialysis testament for 120 patients before the war, and now it has to deal with over 600 cases of kidney failure, with dwindling medical supplies.
The grim picture in Rafah right now reflects how Israel’s looming ground offensive would be destructive for the war-weary Palestinians, especially the patients.
No safe place
The Israeli pretexts about plans to evacuate the displaced from Rafah before the offensive didn’t answer the question of where those people will go. No place is safe in Gaza, as U.N. agencies repeatedly said.
Evacuate? Where, to the moon?
The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, also expressed concerns about the looming offensive. He called for the U.S. and other Western countries to stop providing weapons to Israel.
“They are going to evacuate. Where, to the moon? Where are they going to evacuate these people?” Borrell said in a news conference in Brussels Tuesday after talks with the head of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.
“If you (western leaders) believe that too many people are being killed, maybe you should provide less arms in order to prevent so many people being killed,” he added.
Griffiths, the U.N. official, also called for the Israeli government to heed to international growing warnings against “the dangerous consequences of any ground invasion in Rafah.”
“The Government of Israel cannot continue to ignore these calls,” he said. “This war must end.”
