A pause in fighting remains out of reach, as an Israeli assault on Rafah appears imminent.
GAZA – Israel hit the Gaza Strip with air strikes on Feb 20, as world powers grappled with how to broker a ceasefire ahead of a United Nations Security Council vote that was expected to be blocked by a United States veto.
Global powers trying to navigate a way out of the spiralling crisis have so far come up short, with a push later on Feb 20 for a UN ceasefire resolution facing an expected US veto. The city, the last untouched by Israeli ground troops, is also the main entry point for desperately needed relief supplies via neighbouring Egypt.
One in six children in northern Gaza is now acutely malnourished, Unicef said, a situation poised to “compound the already unbearable level of child deaths”.Hamas militants also took about 250 hostages – 130 of whom remain in Gaza, including 30 presumed dead, according to Israel. “Troops are continuing intensive operations in western Khan Younis and killed dozens of terrorists over the past day,” the army said on Feb 20, adding that it had also struck a Hamas arms depot in the city, triggering secondary explosions.Witnesses said Gaza City’s southern Zeitoun neighbourhood had also come under heavy bombardment.
It has warned that, unless all Israeli hostages still held in Gaza are freed by the start of Ramadan on March 10 or 11, it will“If by Ramadan the hostages are not home, the fighting will continue everywhere to include the Rafah area,” said war Cabinet member Benny Gantz.International mediators have been scrambling to avert the assault and its feared mass civilian casualties.The first, drafted by Algeria, demands an immediate humanitarian ceasefire and “unconditional release of all hostages”.
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