The war drums pound on the gateway to Gaza city. The residents of northern Gaza’s largest city, packed with locals and refugees, fear that time will be ticked before the looming Israeli attack.
Dozens gathered on Thursday in small but rebellious protests in a war-stricken city building.
Fearing further movement and escalation of bombing, men, women and children took them to the city and waving Palestinian flags to read “stop genocide” and “Gaza is dying.”
“We send the final call to the whole world. Stop the war. We won’t displace,” the Palestinian man told Mike.
“And we tell US President Donald Trump: … If we care about the (Nobel) Peace Prize, we must stop all the wars in the world, starting with the war with the Gaza Strip, which has taken thousands of Palestinian lives in the last two years.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday announced that he would approve a military plan to control Gaza city. The Prime Minister had ordered the timeline of his initial plan to be shortened the day before.
“We are in the decision stage,” Netanyahu said at the video address. “Today I came to the Gaza Division and approved the plan (the Israeli Defense Force) presented to me, and approved it to the Minister of Defense for controlling Gaza City and defeating Hamas.”
Netanyahu added that he gave instructions to “start immediate negotiations” to release the remaining hostages in Gaza and “end the war under conditions acceptable to Israel.”
Netanyahu said acquisition and occupation of the largest city in northern Gaza One of the last Hamas bases calls for the army to bring in 60,000 reserves and extend the service of an additional 20,000 people, in addition to what has already been called.
The plan sparked a growing international and national condemnation over the fear that Gaza’s already spiral humanitarian and hunger crisis would worsen.
Mohamed Hamad, a protester who has already been evacuated multiple times, has refused to leave Gaza city
“If I leave Gaza, I’ll never come back,” he told CNN.
“We say no to the world to evacuate, tell the world that we should not leave Gaza city.
Zakaria Bakr is a Palestinian living in the Al Shati refugee camp in Gaza city and said he believes forced evacuation will come.
“They commit massacres, commit bombs on the heads of their owners, bombing them to send messages of fear and threats to force people to leave,” Bakr told CNN, adding, “At the same time, they besiege the city of Gaza and prevent food from entering.”
Bakr said it was unclear if he was alive by the time he tried to leave.
Israeli sources said the military would evacuate Palestinians for about two months to evacuate densely populated areas before the attacks begin, setting a deadline of October 7, the second-year war mark.
Ahmed al-Azira, a 38-year-old lawyer in Gaza’s Alzaiton district, said Israel should not forcefully drive away the city’s residents.
Israeli forces have warned medical personnel and international aid groups in northern Gaza to plan mass evacuations, and previously said they would provide tents to Palestinians before relocating them.
Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) said on Thursday that Israeli authorities are preparing to forcefully replace around 800,000 Palestinians south of the enclave, warning that “the whole city of Gaza could completely destroy or destroy health care.”
Many in Gaza said the severity of artillery fire in Gaza city has been on the rise recently.
Ismail Zaida, a Palestinian living in Gaza’s Sheikh Radwan district, said he felt “like the beginning of a new war.”
Meanwhile, Israel’s strike at a camp for refugees in Deia al-Barah in central Gaza has wreaked havoc in what has been a paradise for many, and where Gaza people are likely to go when a new Israeli attack begins.
Palestinians at the camp said they received a call from Israeli forces who were telling them to evacuate before the camp was struck. They didn’t know that the strike would destroy the entire camp, they told CNN, adding that they were not only unable to go anywhere now, but they were on the streets.
CNN footage showed a massive strike at camp, with smoke swirling from the scene as people ran from rap shotguns. Civil defense forces arrive to find a makeshift tent where a mountain of destroyed belongings buried under the tiled rub is burning.
“There is nothing left, there is no tent (tent) between them. Everything we lived here is gone.
The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) said “In response to Hamas’ wild attacks, the IDF is operating to dismantle Hamas’ military capabilities.”
“In stark contrast to Hamas’ intentional attacks on Israeli men, women and children, the IDF follows international law and takes viable precautions to mitigate the harm to civilians,” the IDF said.
Two evacuated women, Nislin and Rainin, sifted through the ruins for the rest of their belongings.
The Israeli forces gave the inhabitants 30 minutes to evacuate, Lanin said, after which she said the “belt of fire” fell into the camp, annihilation of it.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres repeated the call for a ceasefire on Thursday, saying “we will avoid the massive death and destruction that military operations against Gaza will inevitably pose.”
