The IDF attacked Rafah from the air – NRK Urix – Foreign news and documentaries

In the early hours of Monday, Israel told civilians in the eastern part of Rafah to leave the city.

Hours later, a Hamas-affiliated medium reports that the IDF has launched an air strike against the same areas.

Now the Hamas-affiliated al-Aqsa TV channel reports that the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are launching airstrikes against the same areas of the city.

The IDF asked 100,000 citizens to travel to the so-called “extended humanitarian area” in Khan Younis, the largest city in the south of Gaza, and on a small coastal strip that the IDF refers to as a safe area.

The order came after a night of heavy bombing in Rafah where at least 22 people were killed, according to Palestinian health authorities. Among them were eight children, reports Al Jazeera. According to Reuters, a baby should be among those killed.

Several Palestinian families have now started to leave the area, eyewitnesses from Rafah told Reuters.

NRC: Extremely dramatic.

Secretary General Jan Egeland of the Norwegian Refugee Council tells NRK that he has been in contact with employees in Rafah all day. They have discussed the evacuation order from the IDF.

100,000 people have been given a map where the areas they can flee to are colored red.

Egeland believes the order is against the law because this is the forced displacement of people to areas where they have no housing, no water – it is not possible to get help. So thus it is against the law.

– How are the conditions for aid workers in Rafah now?

– They are very scared, of course. You don’t know if this is the big ground invasion that could lead to a bloodbath, says Egeland.

The danger of a full invasion in Rafah will also paralyze the major aid work in the Rafah area because both border crossings are now closed, says Egeland.

Egeland says that he has 50 colleagues who make a heroic effort in the Rafah area where there are 1.3 – 1.4 million Palestinians who were squeezed together there, says Egeland.

– They were told that this was the safe area. So the attack must not be carried out. Israel and Hamas have a great responsibility to enter into a ceasefire because the Israeli hostages must also be released, says Egeland.

Planned invasion

Israeli authorities have long said they are planning an invasion of Rafah, where over a million Palestinians live in what are described as appalling conditions.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant hinted on Sunday that such a military operation in Rafah would begin shortly.

The area the IDF is now attacking contains an important border crossing to Egypt. This is the only passage for emergency aid into Gaza.

On Monday morning, desperate Palestinians fought for the supplies from the last trucks with emergency aid that escaped through the Kerem Shalom border crossing before it was closed.

– Dangerous escalation

– Action in Rafah is urgent, said Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Monday morning.

On Monday night, he gave the same message to his American colleague Lloyd Austin.

Gallant refers to negotiations on a cease-fire in Gaza that have taken place in the Egyptian capital Cairo in recent days, where the release of the hostages has been a demand from the Israeli side.

Hamas refuses to agree to the release unless Israel promises to withdraw completely from Gaza. It is not relevant for Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week that an invasion of Rafah will take place with or without a ceasefire agreement.

A spokesperson for Hamas, Sami Abu Zuhri, tells Reuters that the evacuation order is a “dangerous escalation that will have consequences”.

The US, Egypt and Qatar have long tried to establish a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, precisely to prevent Israel from entering Rafah.

The negotiations in Cairo broke down on Sunday, but are to start up again on Tuesday.

Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide says that he and the rest of the world are following the ceasefire negotiations now.

– Gaza is a man-made disaster. Words cannot describe the suffering and pain the 2.3 million inhabitants have gone through in the last seven months, he says in a statement.

The UN warns against bloodshed

This is the second time Palestinians have been asked to evacuate to Khan Younis. Shortly after the war between Hamas and Israel broke out in October last year, the inhabitants north of the strip were informed of the same. But already in December, Israel carried out mass attacks from the air and on the ground against the city.

Almost half of the population in Gaza is now living together in makeshift tent camps in Rafah. Over a million people seek refuge there, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Most of them have fled from other places in Gaza during the seven-month-long war.

The UN has warned that an Israeli ground invasion will end in a bloodbath for civilians.

The UN’s Office of Emergency Relief (OCHA) operates health clinics, food distribution centers and a center for malnourished children in Rafah. The emergency aid work could break down completely if Israel invades.

The WHO has already drawn up a plan for what must be done if Israeli forces move in.

The plan includes, among other things, establishing a field hospital, but it will not be enough to prevent a significant increase in the number of deaths.

The order comes after heavy bombing

The residents of Rafah told AFP on Sunday that they feared that a break in the negotiations on a ceasefire would lead to more violence in the area.

Sunday evening and night to Monday it escalated.

Three Israeli soldiers were killed and nine wounded when Hamas launched ten rocket-propelled grenades at the Kerem Shalom border crossing, which lies between Israel, Egypt and Rafah. This should have made the talks on a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip more difficult, according to an Egyptian delegate to the negotiations.

In return, 22 Palestinians were killed in two Israeli airstrikes against two different places in Rafah on Monday night.

In addition, the IDF closed Kerem Shalom. The border crossing plays an important role in getting emergency aid into Gaza, where millions of Palestinians are starving after seven months of war.