The city in the northern Gaza Strip is the focus of Israel's offensive. "We have made significant gains and have crossed the outskirts of Gaza City. We are advancing," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement.
Israeli troops surrounded Gaza City during the landing operation. Photo: AP
Losses on both sides
Amid loud explosions in Gaza, Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari told reporters that "his country's army has completed the siege of Gaza City, the heartland of the Hamas terrorist organization".
However, Brigadier General Iddo Mizrahi, the head of Israel's military engineering team, said the army was encountering mines and booby traps. "Hamas has learned and prepared well," he said.
Abu Ubaida, a spokesman for the Hamas armed wing, said in a televised speech on Thursday that the number of Israeli soldiers killed in Gaza was much higher than what the opposition announced.
Israel previously said it had lost 18 soldiers and killed dozens of Hamas militants since ground operations expanded last Friday.
Witnesses said Islamic Jihad fighters allied with Hamas in Gaza emerged from the tunnels to fire at the tanks, then disappeared back down the dense network of tunnels.
In a Hamas military video, a fighter appears in a field in Gaza and places an explosive device on a tank. An explosion can be heard as the fighter, wearing a body camera to record the incident, sprints back into the tunnel and fires an anti-tank missile at the tank.
“Water is being used as a weapon”
Palestinians are suffering from shortages of food, fuel, drinking water and medicine. “Water is being used as a weapon of war,” said Juliette Touma, spokeswoman for the United Nations Palestinian Refugee Agency (UNRWA).
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has arrived in the Middle East after saying he would discuss concrete steps to minimize civilian suffering in Gaza. During meetings in Israel and Jordan, he also discussed the future of Gaza and laid the groundwork for a future Palestinian state.
The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is getting worse. Photo: AP
In Geneva, UN special rapporteurs issued a statement calling for a ceasefire, saying Palestinians were at "grave risk of genocide".
The Israeli mission to the United Nations in Geneva called the comments “deplorable and deeply disturbing” and blamed Hamas for the civilian deaths. Israel said it was targeting Hamas and accused the group of deliberately hiding in population centres.
UN human rights chief Volker Turk has said what he called Israeli "sieges" were illegal under international law and that Israeli air strikes on Gaza's largest refugee camp this week may constitute war crimes.
On Thursday, the Rafah border crossing from Gaza to Egypt was opened for limited evacuations for a second day under a Qatar-brokered deal to allow some foreign passport holders, their dependents and some wounded Gazans to leave the enclave.
Palestinian border official Wael Abu Mehsen said another 400 foreign nationals would leave Egypt through the Rafah border crossing on Thursday, after about 320 on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the humanitarian and health crisis in Gaza is getting worse. Rafif Abu Ziyada, 9, said he is drinking dirty water and suffering from stomach aches and headaches. More than a third of Gaza’s 35 hospitals are out of order, many of which have been turned into makeshift refugee camps.
“The situation is beyond dire,” said the charity Medical Aid for Palestine, describing corridors packed with patients. Many of the doctors are relatives of the victims themselves and have also been left homeless.
Hoang Anh (according to Reuters, AP, AJ)
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