The Israeli military operation in Rafah was particularly controversial during the Gaza War. Israel justified it by saying that the remaining Hamas troops there had to be destroyed.
Israel claims to have defeated the Hamas Brigade in the Rafah area in the south of the Gaza Strip. Israeli Defense Minister Joav Galant said during a visit to the border area between the Gaza Strip and Egypt: “The Rafah Brigade has been defeated and more than 150 tunnels in this region have been destroyed.” He has instructed the troops to concentrate in the coming period on destroying the remaining tunnels on the border between the coastal strip and Egypt.
In May, despite massive international criticism, Israel advanced into Rafah to destroy the remaining forces of the Islamist terrorist organization. Around a million refugees who had crowded into the city, according to estimates, left the city again. Israeli troops also captured the Rafah border crossing to Egypt and the so-called Philadelphia Corridor.
This approximately 14-kilometer-long area is considered one of the biggest points of contention in the negotiations for a Gaza ceasefire. Hamas is demanding a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on the other hand, insists that Israel must continue to control the corridor even after a ceasefire in order to prevent weapons smuggling, for example.
The Gaza war was triggered by the worst massacre in Israel’s history, with more than 1,200 deaths, carried out by terrorists from Hamas and other extremist groups on October 7 last year. More than 250 hostages were abducted from Israel to Gaza.
According to the Hamas-controlled health authority, 40,223 people have been killed and almost 93,000 injured in the subsequent Israeli offensive in the sealed-off coastal strip. The figures, which cannot be independently verified, do not distinguish between fighters and civilians.
