Description
Added on the 08/10/2023 11:44:33 - Copyright : France 24 EN
Palestinian Islamist group Hamas launched the biggest attack on Israel in years on Saturday, killing at least 70 people and claiming it had taken dozens of hostages in a surprise assault combining gunmen crossing into Israel and a barrage of rockets fired from Gaza. The offensive caught the country completely off guard. For more on Israel’s failure to anticipate the attack, FRANCE 24 is joined by Michael Kobi, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies.
Three weeks ago, the Israeli military unveiled a detailed 3D model of Gaza’s Shifa Hospital – showing a series of underground installations that it said was part of an elaborate Hamas command and control center under the territory’s largest health-care center. Days after taking control of the hospital, the military has yet to unveil this purported center. But it has released videos of weapons allegedly seized inside the hospital, a tunnel running through the complex and videos appearing to show Hamas militants dragging hostages through the hospital's hallways. Israel says there will be much more to come. What Israel finds – or fails to find – could play a large part in its efforts to rally international support for its war against Hamas, launched on Oct. 7 in response to a bloody cross-border attack by the Islamic militant group.Gaza’s hospitals have played a central role in the dueling narratives surrounding the war. Hospitals enjoy special protected status under the international laws of war. But they can lose that status if they are used for military purposes. Israel has long claimed that Hamas uses hospitals, schools, mosques and residential neighborhoods as human shields. In particular, it says Hamas has hidden command centers and bunkers underneath the sprawling grounds of Shifa. Hamas denies the allegations. Israel says other hospitals are similarly used for /military purposes. It has ordered the evacuations of a number of Gaza hospitals, including Shifa, as it presses ahead with its ground operation against Hamas. As Israel reveals signs of Hamas activity at Shifa, sans the promised command center, France 24's Rochelle FERGUSON BOUYAHI is joined by Dr Patrick Bury, Senior Lecturer in Security in the Politics, Languages & International Studies( PoLIS) department, at the University of Bath, specialising in warfare and counter-terrorism.
The Israeli forces are "carrying out a precise and targeted operation against Hamas in a specified area in the Shifa hospital" says Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari in a statement. SOUNDBITE
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed Monday that Israel will take control of "overall security" of besieged Gaza after the war, as the Hamas-run health ministry said the death toll has surged past 10,000. Resisting calls for a ceasefire, Netanyahu said there would be no letup in the war to destroy Hamas, whose October 7 attack left 1,400 dead in Israel, most of them civilians. FRANCE 24's Catherine Norris-Trent reports from Tel Aviv, Israel.
The latest developments from the Israel Hamas war.
|
Support : Technical 
- Content 
- Editors 
