Israel. War Will Last Long

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has finally found the strength to announce: in Israel, the deadly attack launched by Hamas on October 7 against the Jewish state killed more than 1,400 people and injured about four thousand. The Palestinian authorities immediately said that losses in the Gaza Strip were even greater: Israeli bombing there killed 2,228 people and injured about 9,000.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), quoted by Israeli newspaper Haaretz, said that 12 journalists have been killed in the past nine days, and two more are currently missing. “CPJ emphasizes,” said Sherif Mansour, the organization’s coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, “that journalists are civilians, who perform important work in times of crisis and should not be attacked by warring parties.”

The situation for civilians in Israel and Palestine is becoming increasingly tragic: while Hamas missiles continue to periodically penetrate Israel’s Iron Dome air defenses, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), through its communications chief public relations officer Juliette Touma, said that “one million people were displaced during the first seven days of the war” between Hamas (the Islamist organization in power in the Gaza Strip – Ed.) and Israel, and “this figure is likely to gradually increase, as people continue to flee their homes.”

The Israeli army urged residents in the north of the besieged Palestinian territory – about 1.1 million of 2.4 million total population – to flee to the south, where Israel on Sunday resumed water supplies at the UN’s request after a blockade that lasted nearly a week. Artillery and military aircraft of the Jewish state are about to strike the north of Gaza City to destroy the Hamas operational control center.

International efforts are mounting to find a peaceful solution to the bloody conflict as quickly as possible, but the United States has said it fears escalation of the war between Israel and Hamas, as well as the prospect of Iran directly intervening in the conflict.

White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said this in an interview with the American television channel CBS, where he raised the question of the possibility of a second front on the border between Israel and Lebanon: “We cannot rule out that Iran will decide to engage directly in some way. We must prepare for all possible scenarios,” Sullivan emphasized.

While Israel is rallying troops on the border with the Gaza Strip, a warning has come from Iran: “If the war crimes and the genocide by Israeli apartheid are not stopped immediately, the situation could run out of control and have widespread consequences.” In a message sent by Iran to the UN, Tehran warned Israel that it would “react if Israel continues its ground offensive in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.” Later on, however, the Iranian authorities changed their tone, saying that “they will not enter the war unless Iran is directly attacked.”