RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel vowed to keep fighting in Gaza until it crushes Hamas after one of the deadliest single battles of the war for its soldiers, even as it faces mounting international calls for a cease-fire and unease on the part of its closest ally, the United States.
The ambush in Gaza City, one of the hardest hit areas of the war, showed Hamas’ resilience and called into question whether Israel can defeat it without wiping out the entire territory. Support for Hamas has surged among Palestinians — in part because of the militant group’s stiff resistance to a far more powerful foe — while the U.S. has expressed growing discomfort over civilian deaths.
U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan was visiting Israel on Thursday, days after President Joe Biden said that Israel was losing international support because of its “indiscriminate bombing.”
Israel has imposed a total siege on northern Gaza, including Gaza City, and has flattened much of it in what is already one of the 21st century’s most devastating military campaigns.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to fight to the end, “even given the great pain and the international pressure,” saying late Wednesday that “nothing will stop us.”
The ambush took place Tuesday in the dense neighborhood of Shijaiyah, which was also the scene of a major battle during the 2014 war between Israel and Hamas. The dead included two high-ranking officers. A total of 116 soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive, which began Oct. 27.
Heavy fighting has raged for days in Shijaiyah and other areas in and around eastern Gaza City that were encircled earlier in the war. Tens of thousands of people remain in the north despite repeated evacuation orders, saying they don’t feel safe anywhere in Gaza or fear they may never return to their homes if they leave them.
ARRESTS IN THE NORTH
The military released footage on Thursday from northern Gaza showing dozens of men with their hands above their heads walking in a straight line out of a damaged building. Four of the men could be seen carrying assault rifles over their heads and setting them down in the street, along with what appeared to be several ammunition magazines.
The military said the men had exited the Kamal Adwan Hospital after troops battled militants in a nearby building. It described all of them as suspected militants, without providing evidence.
The Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said 70 medical workers and patients were detained when Israeli forces raided the hospital earlier this week, including the hospital director. The U.N. humanitarian office said the hospital had 65 patients, including 12 children in intensive care, at the time of the raid.
It was not immediately clear if the military and the Health Ministry were describing the same event.
Israel says it is rounding up men in northern Gaza as it searches for Hamas fighters, and recent videos have shown dozens of detained men stripped to their underwear, bound and blindfolded in the streets. Some released detainees have said they were beaten and denied food and water.
In the video released by the military on Thursday, all the men appeared fully clothed except the four carrying weapons, who were shirtless.
A HEAVY CIVILIAN TOLL
Israel’s air and ground assault, launched in response to Hamas’ unprecedented attack into southern Israel on Oct. 7, has killed more than 18,600 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths. Its latest count did not specify how many were women and minors, but they have consistently made up around two-thirds of the dead in previous tallies. Thousands more are missing and feared dead beneath the rubble.
Nearly 1.9 million Palestinians have been driven from their homes, with most seeking refuge in the south, even as Israel has continued to strike what it says are militant targets in all parts of the territory.
Residents reported two Israeli airstrikes overnight in Rafah, the southernmost town along the Egyptian border. An Associated Press reporter saw 27 bodies brought into a local hospital early Thursday.
One woman burst into tears after recognizing the body of her child.
“They were young people, children, displaced, all sitting at home,” Mervat Ashour said as she and others mourned their relatives. “There were no resistance fighters, rockets, or anything.”
New evacuation orders issued as troops pushed into the southern city of Khan Younis earlier this month have pushed U.N.-run shelters to the breaking point and forced people to set up tent camps in even less hospitable areas. Heavy rain and cold in recent days has compounded their misery, swamping tents and forcing families to crowd around fires to keep warm.
Israel has sealed Gaza off to all but a trickle of humanitarian aid, and U.N. agencies have struggled to distribute it since the offensive expanded to the south because of fighting and road closures.
RISING SUPPORT FOR HAMAS
Israel might have hoped that the war and its hardships would turn Palestinians against Hamas, hastening its demise. But a poll conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found 44% of respondents in the occupied West Bank said they supported Hamas, up from 12% in September. In Gaza, the militants enjoyed 42% support, up from 38% three months ago.
That’s still a minority in both territories. But even many Palestinians who do not share Hamas’ commitment to destroying Israel and oppose its attacks on civilians see it as resisting Israel’s decades-old occupation of lands they want for a future state.
Israelis meanwhile remain strongly supportive of the war and see it as necessary to prevent a repeat of Oct. 7, when Hamas burst through the country’s vaunted defenses. Palestinian militants attacked communities across southern Israel that day, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking some 240 hostage.
Around half the hostages, mostly women and children, were released last month during a weeklong cease-fire in exchange for the release of 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
