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The world is apprehensively awaiting the start of a major ground warfare incursion into the Gaza city of Rafah by Israeli Defence Forces.
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Israel has already reportedly encouraged the evacuation of more than 100,000 people from eastern Rafah and moved up armoured units, before the start of an expected major ground intervention in the area near the Egyptian border.
The city originally had a population of around 275,000 people and now has more than 1.4 million people reportedly taking refuge in Rafah, according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees.
The new military action comes after Israel alleged that rockets were fired by Hamas from eastern Rafah, killing four Israeli soldiers.
“We’ve highlighted for the Israelis is that it’s really important to make sure that the civilians that are in that battlespace move out of the battlespace before any activity is conducted,” said United States Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, speaking at a joint press conference in Honolulu on 3 May.
“If and when they return to any kind of an operation, that it’d be conducted in a much more precise fashion.
“They have not yet moved the civilians out of the battlespace … (and) there are some 275,000 or so people that were living in and around Rafah before the conflict started. Now there’s 1.4 million or so people that are there. That’s a lot of people in a very small space.
“It’s a good chance that … without taking the right measures, we will see a lot more civilian casualties going forward. So, before anything happens, we certainly want to see them address that threat to the civilians.
“We would ask that things be sequenced. (However) right now the conditions are not favourable to any kind of operation. It’s necessary to take care of the civilians; the fleeing population that’s in that area before anything else happened.”
The ground intervention follows the fallout of an Egyptian–Qatari proposal to bring about a temporary ceasefire in Gaza. The proposal has reportedly been agreed to by Hamas and rejected by Israel, due to falling short of expected Israeli considerations. Israel is seeking the unconditional return of all hostages taken by Hamas and the end of the Palestinian militant group.
Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Major General Pat Ryder, speaking at an off-camera, on-the-record press briefing, said the world is expecting restraint regarding any imminent military actions by the IDF in Rafah.
“(The US has) stressed the need for any potential Israeli military operation in Rafah to include a credible plan to evacuate Palestinian civilians and maintain the flow of humanitarian aid,” Air Force Maj. Gen. Ryder said on 6 May.
“We do know that they (the IDF) have notified some of the people in Rafah to evacuate, so of course, we’re continuing to monitor that. We’ve been very clear publicly and privately … that we still want to ensure that civilian safety and humanitarian assistance are taken into account as it relates to any potential operations in Rafah, and we’ll continue to emphasise that to our Israeli partners.
“We’re going to continue to be focused on getting humanitarian assistance into Gaza, whether it’s via air or the maritime corridor, and of course, you know, also continuing to work to try to increase the flow via land.
“In any type of operation that goes after Hamas that’s in Rafah, sequencing is important, and the point there is that given the large number of civilians and ensuring that those civilians can be evacuated from the battlespace so as to mitigate potential civilian casualties or suffering.
Maj. Gen. Ryder said the US Department of Defense could not confirm if a halt had been put into place on providing military ammunition to Israeli.
“Broadly speaking, we’ve provided a significant amount of security assistance to Israel in support of its defence, but I don’t have anything on any particular individual cases or security assistance,” he said.
“We agree with our Israeli partners on the importance of defeating Hamas and preventing them from being able to conduct attacks like they’ve done in the past. But we want to see that operation (in Rafah) done in a way that, again, takes into account civilians, takes into account how you’re going to evacuate them off the battlefield. And so, those conversations will continue.”
