Operation Iron Swords - Day 18 - 24 October 2023

Palestinian armed group Hamas launched thousands of missiles at Israel and deployed its militants to infiltrate Jewish settlements near the country’s border with Gaza on 07 October 2023. The 1,200 Israelis killed on the first day would be the equivalent of 36,000 Americans killed in an attack, as a proportion to Israel’s population of 9.3 million people (compared to 332 million in the USA). Israeli President Isaac Herzog stated: “Not since the Holocaust have so many Jews been killed in one day". PM Netanyahu stated "On October 7th, Hamas murdered 1,400 Israelis. Maybe more. This is in a country of fewer than 10 million people. This would be equivalent to over 50,000 Americans murdered in a single day. That’s twenty 9/11s. That is why October 7th is another day that will live in infamy."

The New York Times said in an editor’s note that it published “news of an explosion at a hospital in Gaza City, leading its coverage with claims by Hamas government officials that an Israeli airstrike was the cause and that hundreds of people were dead or injured. The report included a large headline at the top of The Times’ website.”

“The Times’s initial accounts attributed the claim of Israeli responsibility to Palestinian officials, and noted that the Israeli military said it was investigating the blast. However, the early versions of the coverage — and the prominence it received in a headline, news alert and social media channels — relied too heavily on claims by Hamas, and did not make clear that those claims could not immediately be verified. The report left readers with an incorrect impression about what was known and how credible the account was.”

The Times acknowledges, “Given the sensitive nature of the news during a widening conflict, and the prominent promotion it received, Times editors should have taken more care with the initial presentation, and been more explicit about what information could be verified.”

As Max Boot wrote in The Washington Post, “The Hamas-controlled Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza immediately blamed the blast on an Israeli airstrike and claimed that 500 civilians had been killed. This ‘breaking news’ was immediately, and credulously, picked up by Western news media. (BBC alert: “Hundreds of people have been killed in an Israeli strike on a hospital in Gaza, according to Palestinian officials.”)

The United States publicled shared its initial intelligence assessments while also sharing more detailed findings with key governments. "We have gone out and shared analysis with a lot of our partners around the world," a senior U.S. intelligence official told reporters late Tuesday, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the incident. "Thus far it's been fairly robust in terms of what we've been able to provide," the official added. "I suspect we will be updating it and sending additional information out as we move forward."

It is unclear, at this point, how much of an impact the intelligence sharing is having. "One of the things that our diplomats have asked … is that the intelligence community do more to lay out our thinking," the senior official said. "There has been intense interest in the hospital explosion and conflicting accounts about what happened," a second senior U.S. official told VOA. "The U.S. government has worked to be able to share as much information as we could in the interest of transparency."

The tactic of declassifying and sharing this type of sensitive intelligence is increasingly part of the U.S. playbook. U.S. officials used it most notably in the lead-up to Russia's February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Since then, however, the U.S. has used what the White House calls "strategic downgrades" to counter Chinese claims about a spy balloon that traversed much of the United States and to defuse a potential crisis in Mali.

In the case of the explosion at the Ahli Arab Hospital, U.S. intelligence officials believe there is compelling evidence to exonerate Israel. Based on information culled from a variety of sources, including satellite imagery, data on missile activity and intercepted communications, as well as publicly available video and images, U.S. intelligence officials concluded with "high confidence" that Israel was not responsible for the hospital explosion.

"There are two primary reasons," said a second U.S. intelligence official, who like the other officials, spoke on the condition of anonymity. "The first is what we see when we look at the blast effects," the official said. "The damage at the hospital is consistent with what we would expect to see from a rocket and inconsistent with the larger craters and broader blast effects that we would expect to see were this an airdrop munition or an artillery round. "The detonation of the warhead resulted in only light structural damage at the hospital," the official continued. "There was no observable damage to the main hospital building, no large impact craters, only light damage to the roofs of the two structures near the main hospital building. And both of them remained intact."

The second reason for high confidence that Israel was not involved, according to the official, comes from videos that captured the launch and explosion, from four different angles. Based on two of the videos, U.S. intelligence determined the rocket was launched from within the Gaza Strip, traveling in a northeasterly direction. Then, about 10 seconds into the rocket's flight, the motor starts having trouble and becomes unstable. "We can tell that in part based on the fluctuating intensity of the rocket's plume," the official said. Five seconds later, the videos show a flash – "our assessment is that that is the rocket motor failing," the official said, and five seconds after that, one object hit the ground followed by a second, a few seconds later, resulting in a large explosion. "Our conclusion is that there was a catastrophic motor failure that likely occurred which separated the motor and the warhead," the official said. "The warhead landed in the hospital compound."

Gaza's health ministry said the explosion killed about 500 people. But U.S. officials told VOA news last week that they assessed the number of deaths was likely between 100 and 300, with the actual death toll likely on the lower end of the scale. Officials said getting a more accurate count will likely be difficult and cast doubt on the ability of Hamas authorities to keep track of casualties given that they themselves "are struggling to function at this point in time."

U.S. intelligence officials likewise pushed back on some theories, popular on social media, that seek to blame Israel for a Palestinian rocket falling in Gaza, including claims that the rocket was shot down by Israel's Iron Dome defense system. "Our understanding is that the Iron Dome would not intercept a rocket that was still burning," the U.S. intelligence official said. "Their SOPs [standard operating procedures] are that they would have to calculate where it's likely to go. And until that rocket has finished burning through its propellant, it's not going to be clear exactly how far it's going to go."

And the officials backed up Israeli claims that the failure rate for Hamas rockets is high. Israel in recent days has said that on Oct. 21 alone, as many as one in five Hamas rockets failed, hitting Gaza instead of targets in Israel. One area in which U.S. intelligence was still trying to get clarity is the question of who fired the rocket that ended up striking the Ahli Arab Hospital. The current U.S. assessment pointed to Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another Palestinian militant group, as the most likely culprit. But officials say they have "low confidence" in the finding because it is based, in part, on an intercepted communication between other militants thought to be part of Hamas.

"They themselves are speculating about who's responsible," the U.S. intelligence official said, adding the audio examined by U.S. intelligence is different than audio circulated by Israeli officials last week, which has been subject to criticism. "There is additional audio that was passed to us by the Israelis that has been carefully vetted and determined to be authentic communications of Palestinian militants. … The language patterns have been evaluated and determined to be authentic," according to the official.

Palestinian Islamic Jihad has denied it launched the rocket that fell on the Ahli Arab Hospital. But U.S. officials counter that, using geolocation techniques and other data, they are confident the rocket that caused the damage was fired from Gaza and suffered a catastrophic failure, causing the warhead to land by the hospital.

"This issue is not closed for us," said the senior U.S. intelligence official. "If we get additional information that would point in a different direction, we would report that out, as well."

Israel said it had dropped 6,000 bombs on the Gaza Strip since Hamas's attack on October 7, nearly matching the number of bombs the US used in Afghanistan in one year. The HAMAS had reportedlly fired about 7400 rockets at Israel. The group said it launched 5,000 rockets in the initial barrage. Israel’s military said 2,500 rockets were fired.

More than 700 Palestinians were killed in overnight Israeli airstrikes, Gaza’s health ministry said, the highest 24-hour death toll since Israel began a bombing campaign to crush Hamas militants who stunned the country with a deadly October 7 attack. Israel said it had killed dozens of Hamas fighters in the overnight strikes on the besieged enclave but said its war to destroy the Palestinian group would take time.

At least 5,791 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched retaliatory air strikes in Gaza on October 7, the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza said. Of those, 2,360 were children, and 1,119 were women. Another 15,273 people were wounded in the strikes, the ministry said. About 1,500 people across Gaza were believed to be buried under the rubble, most of whom are martyrs, according to spokesman for the Palestinian Ministry of Interior in the Gaza Strip, including 720 children according to health authorities. IDF said it was holding 1,500 bodies of HAMAS terrorists. The Occupied West Bank saw 95 killed and 1,650 wounded, while Israel numbered 1,405 killed and 5,431 wounded. At least 307 Israeli soldiers had been killed since war started.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) updated to 222 the number of people held hostage by the militant group Hamas since its deadly October 7 attacks. Israeli authorities announced that they had arrested about 800 Palestinians after the start of Al-Aqsa Flood, including 500 members of the Hamas movement. The number of prisoners in the occupation prisons reached more than 6 thousand detainees after the escalating arrest campaigns since the Battle of Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7, including about 50 female prisoners, and more than 1,600 administrative detainees.

Simon Teasdale, a foreign affairs commentator for the British newspaper The Guardian, said in an article in the newspaper that the children of Gaza are being killed, maimed, and traumatized hour by hour, while “the leaders of our countries” fail to intervene, adding that what is happening to these children represents a problem for all human beings, and everyone should not look away.

He added that the mental health of Gaza's children under the age of 18, who constitute 47% of the Strip's population of 2.2 million people, has been in crisis for years, adding that 4 out of every 5 children say they suffer from depression, sadness, or fear, which is a sharp deterioration compared to a study issued in 2018. A 2022 report on the negative psychological effects of the "chronic war on the minds of young people" stated that more than half of Gaza's children are contemplating suicide and 3 out of every 5 suffer from self-harm.

He stressed that they will ask who killed their brothers, sisters, parents, and friends and why they did it, and they will ask what the world did to stop the killing, and they will be haunted by bitter memories of blood and tears, and they will demand justice, and some, like many before, will take matters into their own hands wherever they can.

Fighter jets attacked dozens of infrastructures and various gathering points of Hamas in the neighborhoods of Sajaiya, Shati, Jabaliya, Darj Tafah and Zeytun. As part of the extensive operation to negate Hamas' capabilities, the IDF attacked dozens of armed Hamas operatives who were preparing to launch rocket fire and other terrorist acts towards the Israeli rear. In addition, an IDF aircraft attacked an operational tunnel shaft used by Hamas which allowed the operatives quick access to the beach, and during the night IDF aircraft also attacked operational headquarters used by Hamas operatives and assembly points of the terrorist organization located inside mosques.

The Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ), announced that a naval force of its fighters was able to infiltrate the beaches of Zikim, south of Ashkelon , and clash with the occupation forces, while the Israeli army announced that it had killed a number of infiltrators. The Al-Qassam Brigades said that a force of "frogmen" was able to "infiltrate by sea and land on the beaches of Zikim , south of occupied Ashkelon, and armed clashes are now taking place with the occupation army in that area."

Al-Jazeera correspondent Elias Karam said that this sea penetration may be the largest by the resistance since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza following Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7, which also witnessed the infiltration of resistance fighters to Zikim Beach, northwest of the Strip. Sirens sounded twice in the settlements of Zikim and Karmiya as reports of the infiltration continued. The reporter pointed out that previous infiltration operations were carried out by a few members of the resistance, but the number of infiltrators this time appears to be large, according to Israeli media reports.

For his part, an Israeli army spokesman announced that the infiltration operation at Zikim Beach had been thwarted, and said that his forces were still combing the area, but he did not reveal details regarding the size of the operation and the number of participants in it. The spokesman said that Palestinian naval commandos infiltrated through a tunnel into the sea and then to Zikim Beach. Israeli Channel 12 said that at least 10 militants were killed by Israeli naval fire, while Channel 14 said that clashes were still continuing in the area.

The forces of the Sea Arm located a terrorist cell of the terrorist organization Hamas that left through a tunnel shaft on the beach in the Gaza Strip and tried to penetrate into Israeli territory in the Zikim area through the sea. The forces of the sea arm, in cooperation with the air force and the northern division of the Gaza division, attacked the terrorists, and prevented their arrival at the beach. Fighter jets and naval forces attacked in the Gaza Strip the shaft from which the terrorists came out and the weapons warehouse used by the terrorists.

IDF naval forces spotted the Hamas terrorist cell exiting a tunnel on the Gaza Strip coast and attempting to infiltrate Israeli territory via the sea, near Zikim. Israeli Navy, IAF and ground forces struck the terrorists and thwarted their infiltration attempt. IDF fighter jets and naval soldiers struck the tunnel and weapons warehouse used by the terrorists in the Gaza Strip. Israeli naval forces targeted a cell of divers belonging to the Hamas terrorist organization attempting to infiltrate Israeli territory by sea in the area of Kibbutz Zikim. IDF fighter jets struck the military compound from which the terrorists departed in the Gaza Strip.

The IDF asked the residents of the Zikim and Karmiya settlements to stay in shelters, which indicates the continuation of combing operations in a circle with a diameter of about 6 kilometers, an area where the army deployed large forces in recent days as part of its preparations to launch a ground attack on the Gaza Strip. The reporter added that reports from the area indicate the possibility that a number of members of the Qassam force succeeded in penetrating to a depth of 3 or 4 kilometers and clashing with the IDF soldiers.

The Palestinian resistance carried out heavy missile strikes, targeting Greater Tel Aviv and the towns extending to its north, east, and south, according to what the Israeli army approved. Israeli media reported a number of casualties as a result of these strikes, which also included Ben Gurion Airport. Israeli Channel 12 said that a missile attack hit at least two homes in the Alfei Menashe settlement in the northern West Bank.

An Israeli strategic analyst stated that Israel and the United States will fight the same war together for the first time, so Washington asked Israel to wait before launching a ground attack on Gaza , explaining that the Israeli government and army know that without this partnership there will be difficulty facing a multi-front war.

Writer Ron Ben Yishai pointed out in an article published by Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper that the Israeli army was ready for a military incursion into the Gaza Strip, but was asked to wait for two reasons: the first was an attempt to release the prisoners who had become an international issue, and the second was against the backdrop of attacks from Yemen, Iraq and Syria, which he understood. Among them is that the Americans have become part of a broader battle, and they are asking Israel to wait until their naval forces and missile batteries are deployed in the region.

Ben Yishai saw that the combat situation of the Israeli army in all the battlefields witnessed a noticeable improvement. In the south, the Israeli army stands ready for a ground intervention after the completion of the training, in parallel with intense air raids that will reduce ground losses, while collecting intelligence information regarding the prisoners, and the goal is to be able Who struck the leaders of the organizations and their infrastructure in the least possible time and losses.

As for the north on the Lebanese border, he believes that estimates indicate that there is no interest for the Iranians or Hezbollah at this stage to risk the destruction of Lebanon, just to relieve pressure on the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) in Gaza, as he put it.

Washington was asking Israel to wait on the issue of entering Gaza until the preparations are completed and the extent of the success of the mediations to release the prisoners and detainees in Gaza is considered, and here the administration of US President Joe Biden made it clear to Israel that the issue of the prisoners is not Israeli . Only, and therefore Israel cannot decide alone according to its assessments of its interest, because the talk is about detainees who hold foreign nationalities - American or other - and here Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agrees with this justification, unlike a number of his ministers.

As for the division of roles, it is simple: Israel confronts enemies on its borders, while America directs the war against Iran’s agents, or against Iran if it decides to enter the war itself, and for this purpose the Americans sent task forces and two aircraft carriers to operate in the Mediterranean Sea, the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Arabian Gulf. He explained that the Iranians understood a week ago that this was a division of labor, and therefore they asked their agents to be active in Yemen through the Houthis , as well as in both Iraq and Syria, and the goal was to harm American ships and soldiers throughout the Middle East.

the Americans correctly expected that they would be in the midst of a regional war in which they would defend their forces and Israel, and it is clear that Washington expects that this battle will expand in conjunction with the Israeli entry into the Gaza Strip, so America asked Israel to wait until the deployment of ballistic batteries of the type THAAD is in the area, and has deployed the aircraft carrier Eisenhower, which is expected to arrive there within days.

Zaher Jabareen, Vice President of the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) in the West Bank and responsible for the movement’s prisoner file, said that every prisoner who is not a Zionist is a guest of the Al-Qassam Brigades (the military wing of the Hamas movement) and of our Palestinian people. He eats what we eat and drinks what we drink, and the conditions to which we are exposed, they are exposed. He added - in exclusive statements to Al Jazeera Net - that the Israeli occupation has a law called “Hannibal”, which means killing the hostage or prisoner with his captor, and it is trying to kill all the prisoners held by our people. Whether they were foreigners, Israelis, soldiers or civilians, and indeed it was announced that the occupation killed more than 20 prisoners held by the resistance.

The official responsible for the prisoner file in the Hamas movement indicated that there are contacts and negotiations from several parties demanding the release of the prisoners, whether Zionist or non-Zionist, and we say that this is in the name of the Martyr Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, and it is national security for the movement and there is no need to detail it through the media , but The principled position is that the non-Zionist prisoners are our guests and the conditions in the field are what prevent their release.

But after the Al-Aqsa Flood operation - Jabareen adds - we have the “yield” that enables us to release all Palestinian prisoners without exception, and without the classifications that the occupation was trying to put in any previous negotiations, and we are determined to release all our prisoners from among our Palestinian people and from All Palestinian factions. This is not only a Palestinian national achievement, but an achievement for the Arab nation and for the free people of the world as well, he stated.

Israeli Army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevy stated that his forces are prepared for the possibility of the fighting expanding to include other arenas near and far, stressing the necessity of “bringing about a radical change to the security reality” of the Hebrew state. Halevy said in statements to reporters near the Gaza Strip border: “The IDF and the Southern Command have prepared specific offensive plans in order to achieve the goals of the war... which, as defined by the Israeli government, are to dismantle Hamas and restore security to the residents of the State of Israel, in addition to making maximum efforts.” Efforts to return the kidnapped people.

He added: “We recommend that Hamas treat the Israeli citizens it holds hostage with respect,” noting that this is “necessary” and has to do with the “serious treatment” that the Israeli army will provide to “Hamas.” It will regret the war it launched against Israel, “and has even begun.” You already regret it.” He continued: "Let me put the dots on the letters - the IDF is ready for the ground maneuver and we will make decisions with the political level regarding the essence and timing of the next stage."

Halevy said that at this stage of the war, "there are tactical and even strategic considerations that allow us more time to improve the extent of readiness to begin the next stage." He added: "We attack the Gaza Strip constantly and without stopping, by air and sea. With every passing minute, we intensify our attacks on the enemy to destroy more of its capabilities, eliminate terrorists and leaders, and collect more intelligence information."

Regarding the northern front, Halevy said, “The Israeli army forces are deployed in the north with all their resolve and determination on the contact line, to immediately confront any targeting attempt by Hezbollah.” He added: “We are deployed with the utmost strength and are prepared and prepared for the possibility of the fighting expanding to include battlefields.” Others near and far.” He stressed that the events of October 7, which he described as “unparalleled since the establishment of the state,” require “a radical change in the security reality,” noting that “there are some costs resulting from that, including those related to the period required to wage war.” "All forces and energies have been mobilized."

An article in the American magazine Foreign Affairs stated that Israel's fight against the Islamic Resistance Movement ( Hamas ) in Gaza will be difficult and costly. The article, written by David Kilcullen, an Australian author, counterinsurgency expert, and professor at Arizona State University, provided a summary of the aspects of urban fighting and the difficulties that Israel will face if it decides to invade Gaza .

The writer said that fighting in urban areas represents a difficult tactical dilemma for the attacker, as every room, corner, street, and rooftop must be secured before moving on to the next area, which requires huge amounts of forces and weapons on the ground, in the air, and at sea, and the results of this will be tested. The article points out that the wars that took place in this century in urban areas such as the Iraqi cities of Fallujah , Mosul , and Ramadi, the Philippine city of Marawi, and the Ukrainian cities of Bakhmut and Mariupol, took place in terrifying tactical conditions and included fierce fighting from room to room and in tunnels, which resulted in... Huge loss of life.

He added that Israel's attack, if carried out on Gaza, would be a land, air and sea attack, would require precise timing coordination, and would be slow and grinding. He said that given that military forces use long-range weapons, inland areas can increasingly be targeted by naval weapons, and land weapons can target ships at sea, and in this sense, the entire eastern Mediterranean will form a single regional theater, influencing and being affected by events on the ground in Gaza.

The article emphasizes that urban wars occur on land, in the air, and at sea. As for land, both soldiers and civilians participating in the fighting face severe physical and psychological challenges, as the feeling of constant danger, fatigue, constant threat from all directions, and the terror of combat affect the psyche and mentality of the fighters. Battles are usually confusing and short, and often include clashes with targets within close range, not more than 45 metres.

He pointed out that both Hamas and Israel possess some naval systems, as the Israeli Navy possesses fast attack boats in addition to warships and special forces, and the Israeli army has experience in urban warfare that it gained in Jenin in the West Bank in 2002, and southern Lebanon during the war with Hezbollah in 2006, and the Palestinian territories, and Hamas has elite units, which are naval commandos that led a naval raid on Zikim Beach in Israel on October 7, and seized a military base south of Ashkelon .

He says that the Hamas attack began as a shocking and sudden attack and was not expected to escalate into a costly and long-term battle, adding that the complex and dense urban environment in Gaza will make it difficult for ground forces to understand what is happening, and Israeli army planners will be concerned about the joining of regional players. Others, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon or Iranian-backed militias in Syria, could create a multi-front war. This could prompt Israel to launch a pre-emptive strike on regional players before entering Gaza, but such a strike would be a high-risk gamble.

The article adds that the ground campaign in Gaza entails strategic risks, as the destruction of property, the killing of civilians, and the expulsion of residents, which many consider ethnic cleansing, may harm Israel’s moral legitimacy and reputation and lead to imposing a cessation of political attacks regardless of military progress on the ground, as happened in the Battle of Gaza. The first Fallujah in Iraq in 2004, when a political decision was issued to stop American soldiers and marines. The strategic impact of the loss of moral legitimacy will be severe for Israel and its allies, including the United States.

The writer expected that Israeli efforts to encourage civilians to leave Gaza through official crossing points or designated humanitarian corridors would not succeed entirely, based on what happened in Marawi in the Philippines and Mosul in Iraq, as fighters in the two cities prevented civilians from leaving. The article also noted that Hamas has developed a dense network of defenses in Gaza, including a tunnel system about 483 km long. This underground war, especially in the tunnels near the coast, will be a difficult aspect of the battle, and robotic weapons such as drones could help. In cleaning the underground passages, the intervention of soldiers with weapons, sensors and night vision devices will be necessary to get rid of such tunnels.

In the wake of Hamas’s “Al-Aqsa Flood'' operation, Israeli officials, journalists, and international media have launched a well-coordinated, multi-pronged information operation. As a result, fake news, however bizarre, spread by Israeli officials, journalists and social media influencers, which were then repeated by international media agencies without being verified. One of the most jarring claims that Hamas beheaded 40 babies in Israel spread like wildfire, but as it was debunked, the White House and CNN journalists issued a corrigendum.

Tech Companies like Meta and X, formerly Twitter, are playing a pivotal role in countering the Palestinian narrative by blocking content and deleting pro-Palestinian accounts. The biases of international media outlets were evident in several patterns of coverage. For example, BBC used the term "killed" when reporting on Israelis, all the while, using the term "death" or "died" when reporting on Palestinians killed by the Israelis.

The conflict between Israel and Hamas has been marked by a wave of disinformation. Russia has been active in spreading disinformation about the Israel-Hamas conflict. Russian state media, Telegram channels and officials have largely blamed Israel for the latest violence. The conflict in Gaza plays to the Kremlin's advantage by reinforcing anti-U.S. sentiments in the Global South and diverting attention from Russia's actions in Ukraine. Some Russian media figures and officials have described Israel’s actions in Gaza as an act of genocide against the Palestinian people. The unprecedented amount of fake information about the conflict circulating online has created fertile ground for Russian propaganda.

The Israeli economic newspaper, Calculist, revealed a document that it said was secret, revealing a plan to displace the residents of the Gaza Strip to the Sinai Peninsuls. It said that Israeli Intelligence Minister Gila Gamaliel strongly supports this plan and that she recommended transferring the residents of Gaza to Sinai at the end of the ongoing war. The Hebrew newspaper explained that Gila Gamliel recommended, through an “internal document,” a firm course for the forced displacement of Gaza’s residents.

The newspaper added that although Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi publicly opposed this plan and explained that this plan would make Sinai a base for launching attacks against Israel, which could drag Egypt into a war against Tel Aviv and threaten the peace agreement between the two countries, the Israeli minister is determined to implement the plan and displace the population. Gaza after the end of the war.

The document obtained by the Hebrew newspaper bears the logo of the Ministry of Intelligence and is used in internal discussions between Israeli government ministries. This document was not supposed to reach the public, but it was leaked to a group that is currently establishing a Jewish movement calling itself “Settlement Headquarters - Gaza Strip,” as this group seeks to restore Jewish settlement to the Gaza Strip.

Calcalist said it was likely that the document, which probably would not influence government policy, was written to support the nascent Jewish movement and its goals. The Gamaliel document ostensibly addresses three alternatives for the post-war period, but the alternative “that will lead to positive, long-term strategic results” is the transfer of Gaza’s citizens to Sinai.

The step includes three stages: establishing tent cities in Sinai, southwest of the Gaza Strip, establishing a humanitarian corridor to help residents, and finally building cities in northern Sinai. At the same time, a buffer zone several kilometers wide will be created inside Egypt south of the border with Israel, so that evacuated residents cannot return. In addition, the document calls for creating cooperation with the largest possible number of countries so that they can receive and absorb Palestinians displaced from Gaza.

The document, which the Hebrew newspaper was reluctant to publish publicly, revealed the names of the countries to which the residents of Gaza are expected to be transferred as well, which are Canada, European countries such as Greece and Spain, and North African countries, among other countried.

The Israeli Misgav Institute for National Security Research and Zionist Strategy revealed the finest details of the anticipated Israeli plan to displace the entire population of the Gaza Strip to the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt. The institute published the plan through a study entitled “The final resettlement and rehabilitation plan in Egypt for all residents of Gaza: economic aspects.”

Published in Hebrew on the organization’s website, the paper was authored by Amir Weitman, “an investment manager and visiting researcher” at the Institute who also leads the libertarian caucus of Israel’s ruling Likud Party. The study included several main points on which Israel relies to displace the residents of Gaza to Egypt. The most important of these points is exploiting Egypt’s economic crisis by displacing these Palestinians to Sinai in exchange for “huge material concessions.”

According to the plan, there is a unique and rare opportunity to completely evacuate the Gaza Strip in coordination with the Egyptian government, as there is a need for an immediate, realistic and sustainable plan for the resettlement and humanitarian rehabilitation of the entire Arab population in the Gaza Strip in Sinai, which is well compatible with the economic and geopolitical interests of Israel, Egypt and the United States. United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

French President Emmanuel Macron proposed that the international coalition fighting against ISIS in Iraq and Syria be widened to include the fight against the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza. Speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, Macron stressed that France and Israel share terrorism as their “common enemy,” but gave little detail on how the US-led coalition of dozens of countries could be involved. The coalition fighting ISIS was formed in September 2014 and has supported local partners “to deliver the military defeat of Daesh in Iraq and Syria” and “works to advise, assist and enable” them, including with reconnaissance and intelligence.

“France is ready for the international coalition against Daesh in which we are taking part for operations in Iraq and Syria to also fight against Hamas,” he told reporters, referring to ISIS and promising not to leave Israel alone. Macron also warned against the risks of a regional conflict, stressing the fight against Hamas “must be without mercy but not without rules.” Thirty French citizens were killed by Hamas militants in their attack on southern Israel on October 7. The French president, who met families of French victims at Tel Aviv airport, said freeing nine French hostages was the first priority for France. “They must all be freed,” he said.

Macron’s ability to influence events in the region appears limited by what some analysts said was a shift towards a more pro-Israel Anglo-American line, in contrast with the traditionally distinctive and more pro-Arab French Gaullist approach. “France’s soft power south of the Mediterranean has considerably faded,” said Karim Emile Bitar, a Beirut-based foreign policy expert at French think tank IRIS. “We’re under the impression that nothing distinguishes France from other Western countries now,” he said.

“Makes no sense at all,” says Heiko Wimmen, the project director of Iraq, Syria and Lebanon at the International Crisis Group, referring to the Israeli and American insistence on drawing comparisons between Hamas and Daesh. Hamas might be best compared to the Irish Republican Army (IRA), which fought a decades-long armed struggle against the British government, Unlike Daesh, which instigated Muslims to revolt against their governments, Hamas does not aim to create discontent among the Jews in Israel. Instead, Hamas wants stateless Palestinians to join its fight against the Israeli occupation. Distinctions between Hamas and Daesh are not limited to their ideological differences, according to Wimmen. There are also serious political differences, he says. “Hamas participated in elections and won. They did not come to power by the force of arms. Daesh does not even recognise the principle of political representation, leave alone elections,” says the Beirut-based political analyst.

Wimmen says there are also other differences between Hamas and Daesh. “Hamas emerged from the society it rules over and has social roots. It strives to win legitimacy rather than impose submission. Daesh was a foreign force that imposed itself on society by brutal force. It made violence into a spectacle to rule through intimidation,” says Wimmen. “For Daesh, violence is/was at the core of its ability to rule.”

“Hamas has no record of international terrorism of the sort that Daesh pointedly encouraged around 2015,” says Ibrahim Moiz, a political analyst who has closely observed armed movements. “The identification and equivocation of Hamas with Daesh is not only absurd, but relies on a wilful suspension of memory that effectively erases thirty or so years of Hamas' existence among Palestinians, while incidentally trivialising the very real nihilistic brutality of Daesh,” Moiz said.