Must reach truce; assault on Rafah strategic mistake: Guterres
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United Nations: Israel must spare no effort to reach a truce deal with Hamas, a distraught United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed. He warned Israel that an assault on Rafah would turn out to be a strategic mistake, a political calamity and a humanitarian nightmare, The Indian Express reported.
He told reporters that he is disturbed and distressed by Israel's renewed military activity in the southern city of Gaza. He suggested that the closing of the Rafah and Karem Shalom crossings is critically damaging an already dire humanitarian situation, and therefore, these must be reopened immediately.
Meanwhile, in Israel, thousands took to the streets across the country, demanding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accept the terms of the ceasefire deal. They held mass rallies. Protesters gathered in large numbers at the defence headquarters in Tel Aviv as well as in Jerusalem. In the capital, they marched towards Netanyahu's residence with a banner reading, "The blood is on your hands". There were smaller protests in the cities of Haifa, Beersheba, and Raanana. The largest of the demonstrations happened on the Ayalon highway in central Tel Aviv.
The fresh demonstrations took the stage when there were concerns that Israeli forces might initiate fresh attacks into the southern city of Gaza, Rafah, where nearly 1.4 million Gazans crowded together. Also, the Philadelphia corridor is at risk of such incursions from the Israeli forces.
Hamas announced that it is ready for the ceasefire proposal brought by the Egyptian-Qatari effort. But Israel reacted that the ceasefire deal did not meet its "core demands". Israel had told tens of thousands of Palestinians to leave eastern Rafah.
Despite celebrations in the streets following Hamas's announcement, Israel opted to press on with its campaign in Rafah, conducting night airstrikes and triggering an exodus of thousands of people from the city. Reports emerged of Israeli tanks advancing near the Rafah crossing, a vital lifeline for humanitarian aid and people travelling between Egypt and Gaza.
