Israeli military steps up attacks across Gaza as top US official visits Israel | Israel’s War on Gaza News

Air and ground attacks kill dozens in the besieged enclave as US adviser Jake Sullivan speaks with Israeli leaders.

The Israeli army intensified its attacks across Gaza, killing dozens of Palestinians in the central part of the besieged enclave, as US national security adviser Jake Sullivan visited Israel for talks with senior officials.

Sullivan was expected to press Israeli leaders on Sunday to take a more targeted approach in the Gaza offensive and avoid a larger-scale attack on the southern town of Rafah.

He met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog, as well as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who pledged to continue the Rafah offensive despite US concerns.

The top US official “reaffirmed the need for Israel to link its military operations to a political strategy capable of ensuring the lasting defeat of Hamas, the release of all hostages and a better future for Gaza,” the White House said in a press release. discussions.

Nearly 800,000 Palestinians have been displaced from Rafah since Israel launched an attack on the city last week, according to the United Nations, drawing condemnations from U.N. officials as well as rights groups. man.

The Israeli government says a military operation is necessary to destroy the last bastion of the Palestinian group Hamas.

THANKS @JakeSullivan46 for your important visit and for your continued efforts for the immediate release of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. pic.twitter.com/i0LKgtXs3J

– by Isaac Herzog (@Isaac_Herzog) May 19, 2024

The Israeli military has carried out intensified air and ground attacks across Palestinian territory, with airstrikes killing at least 31 people on Sunday in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said a residential house was destroyed while surrounding buildings “sustained a lot of damage” and became uninhabitable.

The building, Mahmoud said, housed five families who first fled violence in northern Gaza and then were forced to evacuate Rafah after Israel expanded its military operations there.

“They fled to Nuseirat and were killed,” he said.

Israeli forces also moved deeper into the narrow alleys of Jabalia in northern Gaza overnight and on Sunday, returning to an area they said they had cleared earlier in the conflict, residents said.

The Gaza Civil Emergency Service said in a statement that rescue teams had so far recovered the bodies of 150 Palestinians killed by the Israeli army in recent days, and that 300 homes had been hit by aerial fire and Israeli land.

“Open these passages”

Sullivan’s trip to Israel – the last by a senior US official since the outbreak of war in early October – comes as President Joe Biden faces widespread criticism domestically for his unwavering support for Israel amid the war in Gaza.

Although it disagreed with a large-scale operation in Rafah, the Biden administration continued to provide Israel with military and diplomatic support. Last week, Washington announced plans to provide an additional $1 billion in military aid to the United States’ main ally.

Israel already receives at least $3.8 billion in U.S. military aid a year, and rights advocates have urged the Biden administration to reduce its support as the death toll in Gaza continues to rise.

More than 35,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed in Israeli attacks to date.

The humanitarian situation in the territory has also worsened since Israel seized and closed the Rafah land crossing with Egypt earlier this month.

Desperate Palestinians have been filmed climbing onto aid trucks carrying supplies delivered via a newly built US floating pier.

The pier has been criticized as a complicated and expensive alternative to what humanitarian groups see as a more appropriate and much simpler solution: that Israel open land crossings into Gaza to allow aid trucks to deliver supplies.

“The message from all humanitarian agencies is ‘Open these passages’ – it’s as simple as that,” UN humanitarian affairs coordinator Martin Griffiths told Al Jazeera on Sunday.

“We are stuck in the south in terms of operations because we have no fuel and trucks are not getting through because the crossings are blocked, so we have very little to offer to the people of Gaza,” he said. Griffiths said.

Pressure on Netanyahu

Meanwhile, Netanyahu has vowed to continue fighting Hamas until the group’s military capacity is destroyed.

But Israel’s prime minister has failed to implement a post-war plan for Gaza or bring home more than 100 captives still held in the enclave – and he faces increased political pressure in Israel .

On Saturday, as tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrated in cities across the country, war cabinet member and former defense minister Benny Gantz threatened to leave the government if Netanyahu failed to present a clear vision in six points once the conflict is over.

Gantz’s warning was one of the most prominent public displays of a growing division within the war cabinet.

It also comes just days after Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel should not be involved in the governance of Gaza once the fighting ends – a statement that contrasted with Netanyahu’s previous remarks on the need to maintain Israeli control over the territory.