The war in Gaza has been raging since the beginning of May 2021, and the strikes have only gotten deadlier as each day passes. While the Israeli military continues to send unwarranted attacks – which some feel are completely unwarranted – on Palestinian Hamas militants, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu explains that they will continue their actions “with full force.”
In contrary to continuing rise of the death toll throughout the assaults, Mr. Netanyahu said, “We are acting now, for as long as necessary, to restore calm… It will take time.”
According to BBC, Gaza’s Ministry of Health has reported that 42 people were killed in the latest Israeli air strikes. Of the 42, 16 were women and another 10 were children. Since then, the overall death toll from the Gaza conflict has risen to at least 219 people, which include at least 34 women, 63 children and 1,235 others injured. Meanwhile, Israel claims that at least 15 of the individuals that were killed were Hamas militants.
The UN Security Council has held an emergency meeting to call for a ceasefire alongside international mediators. UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Tor Wennesland tweeted, “Stop the fire immediately. We’re escalating towards a full-scale war. The cost of war in Gaza is devastating & is being paid by ordinary people. UN is working w/ all sides to restore calm. Stop the violence now.”
UN Secretary General António Guterres began the meeting by calling for the fighting to stop immediately as well, characterizing the violence of the attacks as “utterly appalling.”
Sunday Was the Worst Day of Attacks
According to reports, last Sunday (May 16) saw the worst attacks so far when an Israeli air strike managed to hit a street after midnight in Gaza, which caused three buildings to collapse seeing dozens of deaths as a result. Hamas also sent an onslaught of rockets to the southern portion of Israel subsequently throughout the night and into the afternoon.
As warning sirens went off in Israel, millions of residents moved to shelters and safe rooms. Although a number of Palestinians attempted to do the same, sadly because of how densely populated Gaza is, they didn’t exactly have the same option.
A Reuters news agency report shared the account of Riyad Eshkuntana, who explained to the media outlet how he thought that by putting his daughters in a room in his home he believed was the furthest from the explosions, they’d be safe. Grievously, only his 6-year old daughter Suzy survived. His three other children and his wife all died during the overnight attacks.
Mr. Eshkuntana said, “I ran to check upon the girls. My wife jumped she hugged the girls to take them out from the room, then a second airstrike hit the room… The ceilings were destroyed and I was under the rubble.”
Later on, the Israeli military came out and explained how they had done strikes on a particular militant tunnel system in the area where Mr. Eshkuntana’s family resided. There was a chance that due to the collapse of the tunnels, the houses above possibly collapsed as well, causing accidental civilian deaths.
The Israeli military has not kept it a secret that they are targeting infrastructure and leaders that are linked to Hamas. They even said that they managed to hit the homes of Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar and his brother Muhammad Sinwar. Both these men are said to be the logistics head and manpower for Hamas, although the Associated Press news agency reported that they were probably not home at the time of the attacks.
But according to the Palestinian health ministry, the head of internal medicine at Shifa hospital – who was an integral part of the coronavirus team – Dr. Ayman Abu Al-Ouf, was one of the people killed.
Meanwhile in Israel, a number of Hamas rockets managed to hit Ashdod, Netivot and Ashkelon, as well as other portions of southern and central Israel, but there have been no reports of casualties so far. The Israeli military has said that during the past week has had the most number of rocket attacks on the country.
Israel’s Iron Dome defense system managed to intercept many of the rockets, yet a few still managed to do a lot of damage to a number of vehicles and buildings, one of which was the Yad Michael synagogue in Ashkelon. The damage on the synagogue included a hole blasted through the wall that was executed right before an evening service that was scheduled to celebrate Shavuot, which is a Jewish holiday. While no one was hurt in the attack, people still managed to clean everything up and continue on with the service.
Another attack in East Jerusalem took place on the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood on Sunday evening as well involving a car-ramming incident. The driver was shot dead while four Israeli officers were injured during the attack.
Reportedly, what caused the latest fury between Palestine and Israel was because of the threat to forcibly remove some Palestinian families from the area of Sheikh Jarrah in order to make way for Israeli settlers.
Will A Ceasefire Occur?
Although both sides had reportedly agreed to a ceasefire, according to an Egyptian security source, the details that were planned in secret via a mediator have seemingly failed so far.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanhayu hasn’t made a public announcement to stop the fighting, but rather explained that Israel would continue with “forceful deterrence” for as long as it was in conflict with Hamas.
He was even quoted saying during a closed question-and-answer appearance, “We’re not standing with a stopwatch. We want to achieve the goals of the operation. Previous operations lasted a long time so it is not possible to set a timeframe.”
UN Security Council Meeting
On Tuesday, May 18, France called for a UN Security Council resolution on the ongoing violence. The 15-member council were unable to come to an agreement on what to announce in a public statement. Although the United States is said to be a strong ally of Israel, US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said that the US has been unceasingly trying to end the conflict and would give their support “should the parties seek a ceasefire.”
White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, told reporters, “Our goal is to get to the end of this conflict. We are going to evaluate day by day what the right approach is. It continues to be that quiet, intensive behind-the-scenes discussions are tactically our approach at this time.”
While the state of a ceasefire is still hanging in the balance, alongside Egypt and UN mediators, the UN General Assembly is said to be set for another discussion to end the violence on May 20, Thursday.
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