The Israeli Ministry of Defense and the IDF notified the UN just before midnight local time that Palestinians living north of Wadi Gaza should evacuate to the southern part of the Gaza Strip in the next 24 hours, according to UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric and another source with direct knowledge.
The big picture: More than 1 million Palestinians live in this area. The message could be a signal that the Israeli military is preparing for an imminent ground operation.
The sources told Axios that the IDF's reason for the notification was in order for civilians not to be hurt by the military's actions and operations.
More than 1,530 Palestinians and 1,200 Israelis have been killed, thousands have been injured, and hundreds of thousands of others have been displaced since the latest fighting between Israel and Hamas began. Hamas is believed to be holding about 150 hostages in Gaza.
Driving the news: The Israeli military has carried out a heavy bombardment of Gaza since Hamas militants attacked Israel on Saturday.
It's also imposed a "complete siege" on the enclave, which is home to more than 2 million Palestinians.
What they’re saying: The IDF said in an announcement to Gaza City residents that they should all evacuate and move south of Wadi Gaza.
It will "continue to operate significantly in Gaza City" in the coming days and Israeli forces will "make extensive efforts to avoid harming civilians," the IDF said.
"You will be able to return to Gaza only when another announcement permitting it is made," the IDF said.
The IDF urged residents to distance themselves from Hamas, which it said was using them as human shields.
It warned civilians not to approach the area of a security fence with Israel because it said Hamas militants were hiding in tunnels "underneath homes and buildings and populated with innocent Gazan civilians."
Meanwhile, Dujarric told Axios: "Today, just before midnight local time, team leaders of the UN Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the Department of Safety and Security in Gaza were informed by their liaison officers in the Israeli military that the entire population of Gaza north of Wadi Gaza should relocate to southern Gaza within the next 24 hours.
"This amounts to approximately 1.1 million people. The same order applied to all UN staff and those sheltered in UN facilities – including schools, health centers and clinics," Dujarric said.
"The United Nations considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences," Dujarric added.
"The United Nations strongly appeals for any such order, if confirmed, to be rescinded avoiding what could transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation."
State of play: UN Secretary-General António Guterres spoke twice on Thursday night with Israeli Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan and said he wants to get clarification at the highest political level about Israel’s request to evacuate the population from the northern Gaza strip, a UN source said.
Erdan in a statement called the "UN's response to Israel's early warning to the residents of Gaza is shameful!"
"For many years, the UN has turned a blind eye to the arming of Hamas and its use of the civilian population and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip as a hiding place for its weapons and murder," Erdan said.
"Now, instead of standing by Israel, whose citizens were slaughtered by Hamas terrorists and who tries to minimize harm to those not involved, it preaches to Israel. It is better for the UN to focus now on returning the hostages, condemning Hamas, and supporting Israel's right to defend itself," he said.
Genocide unfolding.
This is what happens when you give countries like Israel a pass . They just take it as a green light to massacre civilians
This is the approach that will minimize civilian casualties. Forcing Hamas to move will diminish their ability to hide behind civilians like they have been doing. Doing so on short notice will prevent them from moving their weapons, as all of the tunnels have been obliterated in the past couple days.
You can’t evacuate 1 million people in 24 hours, much less when they don’t have anywhere to go. Gaza is fully blockaded and they can’t leave.
Read the article. Only North Gaza is being evacuated.
It’s over a million people, in one of the densest areas of earth, without public transport, petrol, electricity, water and means of mass communication. In addition to that, all border crossings are closed, and there’s not exactly 1 million+ empty houses in the rest of Gaza.
They’re deliberately giving an impossible ultimatum to justify scores of civilian deaths before the fact.
Agreed. This is really to minimize the collateral damage amongst political allies, the UN workers, there is no expectation a million people are going to move in 24 hours. Even if they all left their house at the same time, the streets would be clogged, it would be nearly impossible even if this became an Olympic event. Take any population of a million people, not all of them are young able-bodied physically able, and they have belongings they don’t want to give up. It’s going to take time to move a million people.
We read the article too bro. The thing is it’s an impossible request and they know it. They are just saying it to look good to absolute morons like you
No, the approach that would minimise civilian casualties is to just not mass bomb a city.
Like even if they COULD evacuate, you think the Hams fighters wouldn’t just go with them?
This does nothing but give Israel a free pass to commit mass murder because they gave prior warning.
You will be able to return to Gaza only when another announcement permitting it is made
So maybe never then?
Hamas has to be defeated first before they can return
That would be better than letting Israel kill them all.
“You will be able to return to Gaza only when another announcement permitting it is made,” the IDF said.
Anyone want to bet on whether this will be before or after the Israeli settlers arrive?
What Hamas did is horrific and should not be tolerated. At the same time, Israel is not blameless either, they have been engaging in acts which amount to cultural genocide for a long time. Israel using this war as a casus belli to engage in further settlement expansion would not surprise me at all. Like most wars, this whole situation is shit all over and lots of innocent people are going to die during the dick swinging of the powerful few.Israel removed all the settlers from the strip, why would they put them back in? Can we wait until they actually do things before throwing out wild accusations? There’s enough stuff to criticise already without making stuff up and getting upset about it.
UN:
“This amounts to approximately 1.1 million people. The same order applied to all UN staff and those sheltered in UN facilities – including schools, health centers and clinics,” Dujarric said.
“The United Nations considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences,” Dujarric added.
“The United Nations strongly appeals for any such order, if confirmed, to be rescinded avoiding what could transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation.”
And Israel’s response:
Erdan in a statement called the “UN’s response to Israel’s early warning to the residents of Gaza is shameful!”
“For many years, the UN has turned a blind eye to the arming of Hamas and its use of the civilian population and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip as a hiding place for its weapons and murder,” Erdan said.
“Now, instead of standing by Israel, whose citizens were slaughtered by Hamas terrorists and who tries to minimize harm to those not involved, it preaches to Israel. It is better for the UN to focus now on returning the hostages, condemning Hamas, and supporting Israel’s right to defend itself,” he said.
Holy shit dude…they’re worried about getting their staff out, Jesus fucking Christ.
Karma is a bitch Israel, you have doomed yourself.
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That would be incredibly dumb for so many reasons.
I don’t think they make nukes small enough to only get the northern half of a city, without also getting the southern half, and everything else around the city for a decent radius.
You’d be surprised how how small some backpack nukes can be. The smallest the US ever put into service could have its yield set to as low as 10 tons of TNT. Which would still be big by conventional means, but would be smaller than the conventional MOAB
That’s pretty wild.
What’s even the point of using a nuke at that point? Are they somehow cheaper to produce than conventional bombs of a similar scale? Even if you just want some fallout, you can use a dirty bomb or something, no?
Most nuclear weapons made after ww2 were “variable yield” so you could select how big the explosion you want. And the weapon I mentioned was 10 tons at its smallest but 10k tons at its biggest.
And the Moab with and 11 ton yield is a Biiig mother fucker that can’t even be carried by bombers, only transport aircraft like a C-130. Whereas the nuke can be carried by a single person, fired from a 155mm modified howitzer or fired on top of an air to air missle.
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I’m looking forward to the operation. Godspeed, IDF!
Tf is wrong with you?
Zionist psychopath
Nope.
Hamas terrorists have long been safe and secure in Gaza without any pushback from residents. It’s time for them to reap the rewards of their support. If they still stand by Hamas, so be it.
I’d like to see you push back to a local militia that holds all the power in your area, without the option of leaving.
They weren’t democratically elected, in fact Israel funded their rise to power and undermined the elected government.
It’s really ironic, countries try to destabilize their political rivals, just to create a worse enemy with no checks and balances 10 20 years later. It’s a pattern we’ve seen a lot
I mean, it’s like a fucking cold war CIA operation in how fucking misguided this is.
IDF soldiers have long been safe and secure in Israel without any pushback from residents. It’s time for them to reap the rewards of their support. If they still stand by the IDF, so be it.
This is your alter ego from across the border speaking.
You could say the same thing about the Russian population, and the current war of aggression against Ukraine. Telling any Russian city to empty in 24 hours, bombing civilian targets, are exactly the things that Russia does in the war that are considered war crimes…
It’s not a war crime if the west does it?
Russia and Ukraine are both states, Hamas is a terrorist group. And Israel is a Middle Eastern country, hardly “the west”.
@sugarfree Given Israel’s conduct lately, calling them anything less than a terrorist state is overly charitable
No. Israel is a Jewish state surrounded by countries that hate Jews and want to kill Jews. They have had to defend themselves against all of their neighbors over the years and it’s still happening today. If Israel was a terrorist state, Gaza would not exist.
@sugarfree I can’t hear you over the sound of your Israeli propaganda. Especially considering the ethnic cleansing Israel has conducted against the Palestinians for generations
Hamas is the elected civil government of a population of 2 million people. Just because you don’t like them doesn’t change that.
Russia also commits heinous acts of terrorism against civilians and you don’t call them terrorists. Why is that?
Russia is a horrible country, but there’s a difference between a state that commits acts of terrorism and a terrorist group. That a terrorist group is the elected representative of 2 million Palestinians speaks volumes.
What is the difference between a state that commits terrorist acts and a terrorist group elected in a democratic election?
You are a ghoul.
