Israel vowed to wipe Hamas “off the face of the Earth” as an emergency government hinted at a ground offensive.
In response to the weekend attack that killed 1,200. India has launched an operation to bring home 18,000 citizens in the war-torn nation.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has forged an emergency government to direct its war against Hamas. The government has hinted that a ground offensive would start soon in Gaza and declared that the group would be “wiped off the face of the Earth”.
“Every Hamas member is a dead man,” said Netanyahu, again likening the group to the Islamic State and promising: “We will crush them and destroy them as the world has destroyed Daesh.”
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said, “I say here, to everyone – we will wipe out this thing called Hamas. We will wipe them off the face of the Earth.”
Israel defence spokesperson Jonathan Conricus said that they had evidence and accounts to believe that Hamas is beheading children.
Most of the 2.3 million people in the Gaza Strip have no electricity and no water and 340,000 are now homeless. With hundreds of Israeli strikes raining down on their tiny enclave, they have nowhere to run. With the strip’s only other border blocked by Egyptian authorities, the people said they were trapped. Egypt has refused to provide shelter to refugees who have escaped from Israel.
The country has been pounding targets in the Gaza Strip for five days since Hamas fired 5,000 rockets at Israel on Saturday. The surprise attack — the worst in Israel’s 75-year history — has seen a total of 1,200 people killed, while Gaza has reported over 1,000 deaths. Israel also claims to have killed 1,500 Hamas fighters who infiltrated their towns.
“There are no wreaths left in Israel anymore,” said one of the many volunteers working to prepare funeral flowers for more than 1,200 Israelis killed.
India has launched Operation Ajay to facilitate the return of its citizens from Israel. There are 18,000 Indians in the country.
“Special charter flights and other arrangements are being put in place. Fully committed to the safety and well-being of our nationals abroad,” Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
The first lot of Indians who had registered to return has been notified and they will be put on the first special flight today to India, the country’s embassy in Israel said in another post.