“We are fighting animals and we will therefore treat them as such,” warned the Israeli Minister of Defense on Monday October 9.
Tens of thousands of Israeli soldiers around one of the most densely populated territories on the planet. And a decision with military and humanitarian consequences that are still difficult to imagine. The Israeli army ordered Monday October 9 a “full seat” from the Gaza Strip controlled by Hamas. “No electricity, no water, no gas,” launched Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. “We are fighting animals and so we are going to treat them as such.”
In the process, his Energy counterpart, Israel Katz, ordered the “immediate shutdown” of the water supply of this Palestinian enclave to which Israel supplies 10% of annual consumption. Electricity, for its part, has been cut off since Saturday evening in this thin coastal territory 41 kilometers long by 6 to 12 kilometers wide, populated by 2.3 million Palestinians, or nearly 6,000 inhabitants per km².
Israel, which has occupied the West Bank since 1967, has annexed the eastern part of Jerusalem and has imposed a blockade on Gaza since Hamas took power there in 2007. In June 2006, Israel had already imposed a land, air and sea blockade on the enclave after the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, who was released in 2011. The Hebrew state had reinforced this blockade in June 2007. Since May 2018, Egypt has most often left the border crossing open of Rafah, the only opening to the world of Gazans which is not in the hands of Israel, after years of almost permanent closure.
A “long and difficult” war, warns Netanyahu
Since 2008, the territory of Gaza has been the target of numerous – and very deadly – Israeli military operations in retaliation for Hamas military actions. Particularly in July 2014, when Israel launched the operation “Protective edge” to stop the rocket fire and destroy the tunnels dug from the enclave. The war will leave 2,251 dead on the Palestinian side, the vast majority civilians, and 74 dead on the Israeli side, almost all soldiers.
From Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepared minds for war “long and difficult”, calling on residents of certain areas of Gaza to leave them before Israeli strikes or even for a ground operation to free Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
Since Saturday, the war has already displaced more than 123,000 people in the Gaza Strip, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) announced on Monday.
After crossing the border fence that Israel considered impregnable early Saturday, Hamas fighters rushed from the Gaza Strip into Jewish communities in the south of the country. The Hamas offensive was launched 50 years and one day after this war which took Israel by surprise and left 2,600 dead on the Israeli side in three weeks of fighting.