A senior Israeli official said the latest round of indirect negotiations in Cairo to halt hostilities in Gaza had ended and Israel would proceed with its operation in Rafah and other parts of the Gaza Strip as planned.
Biden on Wednesday issued his starkest warning yet against a full ground invasion in Rafah, saying: “I made it clear that if they go into Rafah… I’m not supplying the weapons.”
Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant replied that the US stance would not deter it from targeting Hamas.
“I turn to Israel’s enemies as well as to our best of friends and say – the State of Israel cannot be subdued,” he said, according to remarks released by his office.
“We will stand strong, we will achieve our goals – we will hit Hamas, we will hit Hezbollah and we will achieve security.”
Israeli Prime Minister said in a video statement: “If we must, we shall fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than our fingernails.”
“I say to the world leaders, no pressure, however heavy, no decision by any international forum, will deter Israel from defending itself. If Israel is forced to stand alone, it will do so,” he said.
In Gaza, Hamas and Islamic Jihad said their fighters fired anti-tank rockets and mortars at Israeli tanks massed on the eastern outskirts of the city.
Residents and medics in Rafah, the biggest urban area in Gaza not yet overrun by Israeli ground forces, said an Israeli attack near a mosque killed at least three people and wounded others in the eastern Brazil neighbourhood.
Video footage from the scene showed the minaret lying in the rubble and two bodies wrapped in blankets.
An Israeli air strike on two houses in the Sabra neighbourhood of Rafah killed at least 12 people including women and children.
Among the dead was a senior commander of the militant Al-Mujahedeen Brigades, and his family, and the family of another group leader, medics, relatives and the group said.
Israel says four Hamas militant battalions are hiding in Rafah, where the population has been swelled by hundreds of thousands of Gazans seeking refuge from the bombardments that have reduced most of the coastal enclave to ruins.
Israel’s assault on Gaza has killed nearly 35,000 Palestinians and wounded nearly 80,000, most of them civilians, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said.
It launched its offensive in response to a cross-border attack by Hamas militants on Israel on October 7 in which they killed about 1200 people and abducted 252. Some 128 hostages remain in Gaza and 36 have been declared dead, according to the latest Israeli figures.
– AAP
