By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Kamel Hamdan
CAIRO/GAZA (Reuters) – Israeli forces advanced into the northern Gaza neighborhood of Shejaia on Sunday and also pushed deeper into western and central Rafah in the south, killing at least six Palestinians and destroying several homes, residents said.
Israeli tanks, which returned to Shejaia four days ago, fired shells at several houses, leaving families trapped inside and unable to leave, residents said.
Speaking at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his position that there is no substitute for achieving victory in the war against Hamas.
“Our forces are operating in Rafah, Shejaia, everywhere in the Gaza Strip. Every day, dozens of terrorists are eliminated. This is a difficult fight that is being fought on the surface, sometimes in hand-to-hand combat, and underground as well,” Netanyahu said.
“We are committed to fighting until we achieve all our objectives: eliminating Hamas, returning all our hostages, ensuring that Gaza never again constitutes a threat to Israel, and returning our residents safely to their homes in the south and north,” he added.
The Israeli military said forces operating in Shejaia had killed several Palestinian gunmen over the past day. Israeli forces located military infrastructure inside a United Nations school and discovered dozens of weapons and “valuable intelligence documents,” the military also said.
On Saturday, the army announced the deaths of two Israeli soldiers in northern Gaza.
In another raid in Shejaia, forces located a “terrorist war room” in a clinic, the military said, again accusing Hamas of “embedding itself in civilian structures for terrorist purposes.”
Hamas denies using civilian sites such as schools and hospitals for military purposes.
The armed wing of Hamas and its ally Islamic Jihad reported fierce fighting in both Shejaia and Rafah, and claimed that their fighters had fired anti-tank rockets and mortar bombs at Israeli forces operating there.
More than eight months into Israel’s air and ground war on Gaza, militants continue to launch attacks against Israeli forces, operating in areas the Israeli military said it had gained control of months ago.
Efforts by Arab mediators, backed by the United States, have so far failed to secure a ceasefire. Hamas says any deal must end the war and lead to a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Israel says it will accept only temporary pauses in fighting until Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, is eradicated.
RAFAH DEATHS
In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, Israeli tanks advanced into several districts in the east, west and center of the city, and doctors said six people had been killed in an Israeli attack on a house in Shaboura, in the heart of from the city.
The six bodies of the Zurub family were taken to the Nasser Hospital in the nearby city of Khan Younis. On Sunday, dozens of relatives paid their respects before the bodies, which were wrapped in white shrouds, then carried them in their arms to prepared graves.
Residents said the Israeli army had set fire to the Al-Awda mosque in central Rafah, one of the city’s best-known mosques.
Israel has said its military operations in Rafah are aimed at eradicating the last armed Hamas battalions.
The Israeli military said Sunday its forces continued “intelligence-based and targeted” operations in Rafah, killing several gunmen in separate encounters and dismantling tunnels.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said in a statement on Sunday that the fuel shortage would close all remaining hospitals, health facilities and oxygen generators in the enclave if more fuel does not arrive in the next 48 hours.
The latest war broke out when Hamas-led militants swept into southern Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli counts.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has so far killed nearly 38,000 people, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and left the densely built-up coastal enclave in ruins.
The ministry does not distinguish between combatants and non-combatants, but officials say most of the dead are civilians. More than 300 Israeli soldiers have been killed in Gaza and Israel says at least a third of the Palestinians killed are fighters.
(Reporting and writing by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Cairo. Additional reporting by Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem. Editing by Gareth Jones)