Tel Aviv/Gaza (dpa) – Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu emphasized determination in the war against the Islamist Hamas in the Gaza Strip on his country’s Independence Day. „The war rages on,“ he said in a video address. The army engaged in fierce battles from the north to the south. According to the United Nations, an international UN worker was killed for the first time in the Gaza Strip. He lost his life in an attack on his vehicle while on the way to a hospital in the sealed-off coastal strip, a spokesperson said. Another employee was injured. The backgrounds of the incident and the nationality of the victims remained unclear. The US government, meanwhile, defended the Israeli leadership against accusations of committing genocide against Palestinians in the fight against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, on the eve of Independence Day, about 100,000 people at a rally in Tel Aviv remembered the fate of the 132 hostages in the Gaza Strip. The rally’s theme was „Our hope is not lost yet.“ There were also protests against Netanyahu and his government. Against the backdrop of stalled negotiations for the release of hostages held in Gaza and a ceasefire, a speaker at the evening rally stated, „The government, which should protect them with the utmost vigilance, has no right to discuss the price for their return… There is no price for the lives of the hostages.“
Arab mediators hope to reduce the gap between the two conflicting parties, as reported by the „Wall Street Journal“ citing Egyptian officials. They expect to meet again this week for talks in Doha, the capital of Qatar. A round of negotiations in the Egyptian capital Cairo recently ended without results. As Israel and Hamas do not negotiate directly with each other, Egypt, Qatar, and the US act as mediators. Meanwhile, the Israeli army expanded its attacks in the Gaza Strip to areas where the military had previously been operating. They engaged in intense fighting in various locations in the north, center, and south of the sealed-off coastal area, including in the city of Rafah bordering Egypt.
Since the army advanced in Rafah, nearly 360,000 people have fled the overcrowded city of internally displaced people, according to the UN. Israel exerted military pressure on Hamas in Rafah to secure the release of the hostages and dismantle four battalions of the Islamist organization. „We are close to destroying the remaining Hamas battalions,“ Netanyahu said in a podcast. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated that the US remains against a large-scale ground offensive in Rafah, where more than a million people sought refuge from the fighting elsewhere in Gaza until last week. The trigger for the war was the massacre carried out by Hamas terrorists and other groups in Israel on October 7. They killed 1200 people, took 250 others as hostages, and abducted them to Gaza. In the ensuing war, according to the Hamas-controlled health authority, over 35,000 Palestinians have been killed, with the independently verifiable number not distinguishing between civilians and combatants. The high number of civilian casualties and the humanitarian catastrophe for the Palestinian civilian population sparked sharp international criticism of Israel’s actions.
„We do not believe that what is happening in Gaza is genocide,“ said US President Joe Biden’s National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan in Washington. „We have consistently rejected this claim.“ Sullivan stated that the US has detailed their position on this issue in writing to the International Court of Justice. He also emphasized, „We believe that Israel can and must do more to ensure the protection and well-being of innocent civilians.“ Israel’s Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi reportedly lamented earlier that the army had to repeatedly fight in locations in Gaza from which they had already withdrawn due to a lack of a political strategy for the post-war period. Israel is on track to inherit an uprising with many armed Hamas fighters, US Secretary of State Blinken said on US television. There is a risk of a vacuum being filled with chaos, anarchy, and likely Hamas again.
Netanyahu described the war as a fight for the existence of his country during the central ceremony for Memorial Day for the Fallen Soldiers. In his video address on the country’s Independence Day, he stated, „Although this is not a regular Independence Day, this is a special opportunity for us to be aware of the importance of our independence.“ Independence, „to defend ourselves by our own means,“ he said. According to his Defense Minister Joav Galant, the outcome of the war will determine the lives of Israelis in the coming decades. „This is a war without an alternative,“ Galant said. „This is a war that will continue until we bring back our hostages, dismantle the rule of Hamas and its military capabilities, and restore prosperity and creativity to the State of Israel and bring smiles back to its citizens‘ faces,“ the Defense Minister said. At the rally in Tel Aviv on the eve of Independence Day, a speaker accused the government of failing to prevent the terrorist attack on October 7. „We have gone from a united community to a broken and grieving one,“ said a former hostage released in an exchange for Palestinian prisoners according to the rally’s organizers.