Israel formally declares war against Hamas as it battles to push militants off its soil
Israel formally declares war against Hamas as it battles to push militants off its soil
Israel formally declared war on Hamas on Sunday, setting the stage for a major military operation in Gaza as fighting rages on Israeli soil. The declaration comes after Hamas, an Islamist militant group, launched a surprise assault this weekend that has so far killed over 600 Israelis.
Israel formally declared war on Hamas on Sunday, setting the stage for a major military operation in Gaza as fighting rages on Israeli soil. The declaration comes after Hamas, an Islamist militant group, launched a surprise assault this weekend that has so far killed over 600 Israelis.
Saturday was the deadliest day in decades for Israel and came after months of surging violence between Palestinians and Israelis, with the long-running conflict now heading into uncharted and dangerous new territory. Questions remain over how the Israeli military and intelligence apparatus appeared to be caught off guard in one of the country’s worst security failures.
Over 400 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza as Israel responds with airstrikes in the densely-inhabited enclave. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed retaliation, warning his country would take “mighty vengeance” and was readying for “a long and difficult war.”
He urged Palestinians living in Gaza to “leave now.”
From all the nations in the world one would expect that Jews should have learned that being an oppressor is not a recipe for peace.
At the end of the day all comes to politics and media propaganda on both sides. Both sides think they are morally right, but the truth is that neither is and that in most cases innocent civilians are suffering the most as a result. Really sad!
It's hard to believe all of the 400 deaths in the immediate reprisals were military casualties.
Killing civilians just stokes the war engine, driving recruitment up on the military, perpetuating the cycle.
Hamas wants the total destruction of Israel, we can't make peace with Hamas. Driving the population into supporting Hamas is going to extend the conflict. Giving people better options and hope then Hamas is required for some stabile solution. (Not peace, to have peace people need to be free)
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Saturday’s shock attacks by Hamas led to the deadliest day in decades for Israel and come after months of surging violence between Palestinians and Israelis with the decades-long conflict now heading into uncharted and dangerous new territory.
Netanyahu announced Israeli forces have started an “offensive formation” which will “continue without reservation and without respite until the objectives are achieved.” Among the decisions made by the cabinet is to stop the supply of electricity, fuel and goods to Gaza.
The highly coordinated assault, which began Saturday morning, was unprecedented in its scale and scope and came on the 50th anniversary of the 1973 War in which Arab states blitzed Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
“We had no warning of any kind, and it was a total surprise that the war broke out this morning,” Efraim Halevy, the former head of Mossad, Israel’s Intelligence Service, told CNN.
“This Iron Dome is being fired up all around us right now, it’s illuminating the sky here,” said CNN’s International Diplomatic Editor Nic Robertson in Zikim, Israel, referring to the Israeli rocket defense system.
On Saturday he tracked her phone and saw it was located in Gaza; later that day he recognized her in a viral clip of people loaded into the back of a truck flanked by Hamas militants.
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