Israel said Friday that the largest city in Gaza was now a dangerous combat zone when the “initial stages” of its assault on the area seized by hunger began, and that its military had recovered the remains of two hostages of the territory.
“We are not waiting,” said the FDI in a statement. “We have begun preliminary operations and the initial stages of the attack on the city of Gaza, and we are currently operating with great intensity on the outskirts of the city.”
The assault is expected to move thousands of Palestinians from the city, drawing the global conviction and the concern that the humanitarian crisis will deepen in the already devastated Palestinian enclave.
Israel has called to the city of Gaza as a strength of Hamas in the past.
“We will deepen our attacks and we will not hesitate until we return to all the kidnapped and Hamas is dismantled military and governmentally,” added the FDI statement.
The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday that Israel had recovered the body of the host Ilan Weiss of the Gaza Strip.
He said that the remains of another hostage were also recovered, whose identity had not yet been clarified for publication. Those remains were experiencing a forensic identification, he said.
Weiss, 56, who believed he was missing since the attack of October 7 of Hamas, believed he had been dead.
The hostages and the missing families forum, which has organized large -scale protests that demanded a stop the fire to return to the hostages, cried the two losses and asked the Israeli government to “enter the negotiations and remain at the table until they reach the hostages home.”
“Time is running out for the people of Israel who carry this burden,” he said in a statement.
‘Towards the catastrophe’
Israel’s army had previously suspended half -day pauses to the fight in the city of Gaza, which had allowed the delivery of humanitarian aid, saying that the city was now a “dangerous combat zone.”
Netanyahu authorized the operation to take the city last week, despite the warnings of help groups and global officials.
Unrwa, the United Nations Agency for Palestinian refugees, said Friday that the intensification of operations in Gaza would put “about 1 million people at risk of being attributed again.”
“With the famine already confirmed in the area, any additional escalation would deepen and push more people towards the catastrophe,” he published in X.
But Israel has continued and has not given any sign that he will accept a high fire proposal that Hamas said he supported in recent weeks.
The Israeli defense minister, Israel Katz, promised to open the “doors of hell” in the city of Gaza until Hamas agreed to the conditions of Israel to finish the war, including the launch of all hostages and the complete disarmament of the militant group.
Israel called about 60,000 reservists to the expanded operation.
