The Israeli military on Wednesday ramped up its ground assault and strikes on Gaza as Israeli officials announced plans to take over more land in the Palestinian territory.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the IDF was expanding operations in Gaza to clear “terrorists and infrastructure and capture extensive territory that will be added to the State of Israel’s security areas.”
Later in the day, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Israeli military would seize the “Morag axis,” using the name of an Israeli settlement that once existed in the area to describe the territory between the southern Gaza cities of Rafah and Khan Younis. According to Haaretz, the Israeli military said the purpose of the operation is to encircle Rafah.
Netanyahu said the territory would serve as a “second” Philadelphi Corridor, referring to the strip of land on the Gaza-Egypt border that Israel has occupied since May 2024. “Because we are currently dividing up the strip, we are adding pressure step by step so that our hostages will be given to us,” Netanyahu said.
The ramped-up assault on southern Gaza comes two days after the Israeli military ordered the forced evacuation of the entire city of Rafah and nearby areas.
Medical officials told Al Jazeera that at least 77 Palestinians were killed by Israeli attacks on Wednesday. One Israeli attack in Khan Younis killed 12 displaced Palestinians, all members of the same family. Another strike on a UN-run clinic in northern Gaza killed 22 people, including nine children.
Before the latest Israeli escalations, Netanyahu warned he would increase the “pressure on Hamas” and said his long-term plan for Gaza was Hamas disarming, its leaders being expelled, Israel taking complete control of Gaza, and the implementation of President Trump’s ethnic cleansing plan, which he calls “voluntary migration.”
Gaza remains under a total Israeli blockade, which was first implemented on March 2 and forced all bakeries in the Strip to close on Tuesday due to the lack of food supplies and fuel. The US has been fully supportive of Israel’s collective punishment of the civilian population of Gaza.
