Photo: Agence France-Presse In Khan Younes, where a devastated street can be seen here, an official said that around 200 bodies had been exhumed in three days from mass graves inside the Nasser hospital.
Aymeric Vincenot – Agence France-Presse in Jerusalem
Published at 8:25 a.m. Updated at 5:10 p.m.
- Middle East
The head of Israeli military intelligence resigned taking “responsibility” for the bloody Hamas attack that sparked the war between Israel and Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip, announced Monday the army.
The same day, a Gaza official said that around 200 bodies had been exhumed since Saturday from mass graves inside the Nasser hospital in Khan Younes, in the south of the territory. Asked by AFP, the Israeli army did not react immediately.
General Aharon Haliva is the first political or military figure to resign since the unprecedented attack of October 7, carried out by commandos of the Islamist movement Hamas infiltrated from Gaza.
“On October 7, 2023, Hamas carried out a deadly surprise attack against the State of Israel. […] The intelligence service under my command did not fulfill the mission entrusted to us,” wrote General Haliva, who has a 38-year military career, in his resignation letter published by the army.
This announcement comes as Israel celebrates the holiday of Pessah, Jewish Passover, among the most important in the Hebrew calendar. This celebration is marked this year by the absence of the 129 hostages held in Gaza since October 7.
Also read
- 200 bodies exhumed from mass graves at Nasser hospital, Gaza official says
- Iran and Israel seem to be moving away from escalation, new American aid
- The United States and the principle of Spider-Man
Monday evening, during the traditional Seder meal, demonstrators set up a huge table, with empty chairs and plates, in front of the home of the Israeli Prime Minister. They also set fire to another table. The families of the hostages had called for a chair to be left empty around the table, a symbol of the hope of seeing the hostages return.
On Sunday, Benjamin Netanyahu promised to deal “new hard blows” to Hamas, which he considers, along with the United States, Canada and the European Union, to be a terrorist organization.
“Black Day”
“I have carried that dark day with me ever since. Day after day, night after night. I will carry this terrible pain forever,” General Haliva wrote in his letter.
The attack on October 7 resulted in the deaths of 1,170 people, mainly civilians, according to an AFP report based on official Israeli data. In response, Israel promised to destroy Hamas and launched an offensive that has so far killed 34,151 people, mostly civilians, according to Hamas.
On the ground, bombings and fighting continued on Monday in the besieged Gaza Strip and threatened with famine.
Prime Minister Netanyahu continues to proclaim his determination to launch a ground offensive in Rafah, in the south of the territory, which he considers to be the last major bastion of Hamas.
The army maintains that some of the hostages kidnapped on October 7 are being held in Rafah. More than 250 people were kidnapped that day and 129 of them remain captive in Gaza, 34 of whom died according to Israeli officials.
But humanitarian organizations and many foreign countries, including the American ally, oppose this operation, fearing a bloodbath in the border town with Egypt where a million and half of Gazans, residents or displaced.
200 bodies exhumed in Khan Younès
An AFP correspondent reported intense artillery fire late Monday in Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun, in the northern Gaza Strip.
Earlier in the day, drones struck a school playground in the al-Bureij camp in the center of the territory.
“At 1:15 a.m., we suddenly saw fire, debris, and destruction all around us. We started running and found the mosque destroyed,” Mousaad, a resident of this camp, told AFP.
The Israeli army announced that it had launched an operation in the center of the Gaza Strip and “continue to eliminate terrorists and dismantle terrorist infrastructures”.
In Khan Younes, a Gaza official said around 200 bodies had been exhumed in three days from mass graves inside Nasser Hospital. Like other hospital complexes in Gaza, it had previously been the subject of a raid by the Israeli army. She accuses Hamas of using hospitals as a military command center.
A Gaza Civil Defense spokesperson told AFP that several of the bodies found were decomposed, making the process of identifying victims even more complex.
A source at Civil Defense as well as another within the Hamas government, in power in Gaza since 2007, put the figure at 283 bodies.
The Israeli army withdrew from Khan Yunis on April 7.
American aid
The grisly discovery comes shortly after the United States approved $13 billion in military aid for its ally Israel.
For Hamas, Washington gave Israel the “green light” to continue “aggression” against the Palestinians.
The United States insists on the need for an immediate ceasefire associated with the release of the hostages. But the negotiations carried out through the mediating countries have stalled, with both camps accusing each other of blocking them.
In addition to the heavy human toll and destruction, the war has caused a serious humanitarian crisis, threatening the approximately 2.4 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip with famine. Met by AFP, a resident of the center of the territory, Naim al-Goaan, said he transformed a parachute filled with humanitarian aid into a makeshift shelter.
“People took help, and we took the parachute and made it into a tent where my sister sleeps at night, while during the day we use it as a store. »
In addition, violence is increasing on Israel's northern border with Lebanon, between the army and Lebanese Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas, as well as in the occupied West Bank, where Israeli forces are leading almost daily raids, claiming to want to fight against Palestinian armed groups.