Gaza [Palestine], July 19: Health officials and residents in Gaza accused Israeli forces of bombing refugee camps in the central Gaza Strip and attacking Gaza City in the north on July 18, killing at least 13 people, according to Reuters. The Israeli military said it had killed two commanders of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement in two air strikes in Gaza City.
In addition, residents of Rafah, southern Gaza, said on July 18 that Israeli tanks advanced further west of the city and took up positions on a hilltop there. The Israeli military said it had identified several tunnels and killed several militants in Rafah. Meanwhile, Hamas and its allies said they had used mortars to attack Israeli forces southwest of Rafah on July 18.
More than 1 million people have sought refuge in Rafah to escape fighting in the north, but most have been scattered since Israel launched an offensive in and around the city in May. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on July 18 that the fighting had pushed the 60-bed Red Cross field hospital in Rafah to the brink of capacity.
Meanwhile, the deputy commander of the US Central Command, Brad Cooper, announced on July 17 that their difficult mission to bring vital aid to Gaza via the Trident dock had ended. About 9,000 tons of aid were delivered to Gaza via the temporary dock in the 20 days after it was put into operation in May. Mr. Cooper hailed the effort to open the Trident dock, which involved about 1,000 US servicemen, as an "unprecedented operation to bring aid into an active conflict zone without any US troops on the ground.
However, Mr Cooper said the Trident dock began to face problems in May, suffering damage from bad weather, forcing the US military to remove it for repairs and then move it to the Israeli city of Ashdod several times in June due to the risk of rough seas. Mr Cooper added that efforts to deliver aid to Gaza by sea would now shift to the already established Ashdod port in Israel.
In another development, Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on July 17 that the group would target new Israeli settlements if Israel continued to target civilians in Lebanon , according to Reuters. Nasrallah said the number of non-combatant deaths in Lebanon had increased dramatically in recent days. Meanwhile, the Israeli military said it was attacking Hezbollah members and infrastructure in Lebanon and not targeting civilians.
Source: Thanh Nien Newspaper