New satellite images appear to show Israel building a massive tent city as it prepares to evacuate more than a million Palestinians who have sought refuge in Rafah, the last city standing in the Gaza Strip.
Photos from satellite imaging company Planet Labs show a marked accumulation of tents in a uniform pattern near Khan Younis, which has largely been razed during the Israeli army’s bloody invasion of the Gaza Strip.
The photographs, taken three days apart on April 18 and 21 respectively, show white structures being significantly built in a short period of time.
Israel has said several times it plans to evacuate displaced civilians from Rafah ahead of a six-week military operation likely to begin in May.
Egyptian officials told the Wall Street Journal that the first weeks will be spent evacuating refugees to Khan Younis and other areas equipped with shelters and medical facilities.
The preparations come as the United States says Hamas is preparing for a “large-scale regional war.”
The photographs, taken three days apart, on April 18 and 21 respectively, show white structures being significantly built over a short period of time.
Israel has said several times it plans to evacuate displaced civilians from Rafah ahead of a six-week military operation likely to begin in May.
Smoke rises following Israeli attacks, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas.
The conflict has sparked regional unrest pitting Israel and the United States against Iran and allied militant groups across the Middle East.
State Department spokesman Matt Miller said Hamas was “moving the targets” in the hostage and ceasefire negotiations, adding that the terrorist group rejected a “very significant proposal,” although he did not specify what it was. .
He said: “It certainly seems that Hamas is more interested in a large-scale regional war.”
“It takes two to make a deal, and now Hamas has signaled that they don’t want a deal.”
Miller urged Hamas to stay at the table and told the group that the ball was “in their court.”
The conflict has sparked regional unrest pitting Israel and the United States against Iran and allied militant groups across the Middle East. Israel and Iran exchanged fire directly this month, raising fears of an all-out war.
Other groups have also been drawn into the broader conflict, and an elite Hezbollah commander was killed in an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon on Monday.
Mohammad Khalil Atiyeh was a member of the terrorist group’s elite Radwan force.
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows tents and other makeshift housing built around the Tel al-Sultan refugee camp area on Saturday, April 20, 2024.
Civil defense teams and locals carry out search and rescue efforts after an Israeli strike hit the Abdulal family building in Rafah.
Relatives of Palestinians who lost their lives in an Israeli airstrike are in mourning
The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and allied groups have been clashing with Israeli forces along the border for more than six months in the context of Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The war was sparked by the unprecedented Oct. 7 raid into southern Israel, in which Hamas and other militants killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped about 250 hostages.
Israel says militants are still holding around 100 hostages and the remains of more than 30 others.
The war between Israel and Hamas has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, about two-thirds of them children and women. It has devastated Gaza’s two largest cities and left a swath of destruction.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said Tuesday that the bodies of 32 people killed by Israeli strikes were brought to local hospitals in the past 24 hours. Hospitals also received 59 injured people, he said in his daily report.
A Palestinian boy sifts through the rubble of a house hit by an Israeli bombardment overnight in Rafah.
A Palestinian woman sifts through the rubble of a house hit by an overnight Israeli bombardment in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, on April 20.
This brings the total number of Palestinian deaths from the war between Israel and Hamas to at least 34,183, the ministry said. Another 77,143 have been injured, he added.
The Health Ministry does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its counts, but has said women and children account for about two-thirds of the dead.
Around 80% of the territory’s population has fled to other parts of the besieged coastal enclave.
The US House of Representatives on Saturday approved a $26 billion aid package that includes about $9 billion in humanitarian assistance for Gaza, which experts say is on the brink of famine, as well as billions for Israel.
The US Senate could approve the package as early as Tuesday and President Joe Biden has promised to sign it immediately.