Israeli tanks on Thursday advanced in Rafah’s southeast, edged towards the city’s western district of Yibna and continued to operate in three eastern suburbs, residents said.

Simultaneous Israeli assaults on the northern and southern edges of Gaza this month have caused a new exodus of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fleeing their homes, and have cut off the main access routes for aid, raising the risk of famine.

Israel launched its assault on Gaza following a Hamas-led attack on southern Israeli communities on October 7 that killed 1200 people and led to more than 250 hostages, by Israeli tallies. Since then, Israel’s assault in Gaza has killed more than 35,000 people, with thousands more feared buried under the rubble, according to Gaza health authorities.

Israel says it has no choice but to attack Rafah to root out the last battalions of Hamas fighters it believes are sheltering there.

“Hamas is in Rafah, Hamas has been holding our hostages in Rafah, which is why our forces are manoeuvring in Rafah. We’re doing this in a targeted and precise way,” Israeli chief military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said in a statement on Thursday.

“We’re protecting Gazan civilians in Rafah from being a layer of protection for Hamas, by encouraging them to temporarily evacuate to humanitarian areas … So far we have eliminated dozens of Hamas terrorists, exposed dozens of terror tunnels and destroyed vast amounts of infrastructure.”

Israeli forces have killed around 180 militants in Rafah so far, Hagari said.

UNRWA, the main United Nations agency in Gaza, estimated as of Monday that more than 800,000 people had fled Rafah since Israel began targeting the city in early May, despite international pleas for restraint.

In parallel, Israeli forces stepped up a ground offensive in Jabalia, where the military has razed several residential areas, and struck nearby Beit Hanoun town, areas where Israel declared major operations over months ago. Israel says it has had to return to prevent Hamas from regrouping there.

Hamas media said 12 Palestinians were killed in an air strike on a store belonging to the welfare ministry east of Deir Al-Balah city in the central Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military said in a statement forces began conducting targeted raids in Beit Hanoun “to eliminate terrorists, locate and strike terror infrastructure, below and above the ground.”

It said its operations had killed Hussein Fiad, the Commander of Hamas’ Beit Hanoun Battalion in an underground area in Jabalia in northern Gaza.

“Fiad was responsible for launching a significant number of the anti-tank missiles that were fired at Israeli territory throughout the war, along with extensive mortar fire toward Israeli communities near the northern Gaza Strip,” it said in a statement.

A senior Hamas security official, Diaa Aldeen Al-Shurafa, was also killed in an Israeli strike as he toured residential districts of Gaza City, the interior ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said.

The Israeli military said three soldiers had been killed in the fighting on Wednesday, raising the number killed since Gaza incursions began on October 20 to 286 soldiers.

– AAP