FROM OUR REPORTER
TEL AVIV – A row of bodies wrapped in white shrouds. A mother begging her dead son to take her hand; a young man wrapped in bandages, crying next to a corpse; a little boy, his face covered in dust and blood, staring at a blood-stained hospital floor as people scream around him.
The Strip is still burning: the death toll from the attack by Israeli forces launched with two small-diameter US GBU-39 bombs is at least 40 — the reconstruction is by CNN — on the night between Wednesday and Thursday against the second and third floors of the al-Sardi school between Deir al-Balah and the Nuseirat camp. A place where 6,000 souls had found refugeaccording to the United Nations. An operations center of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, according to the IDF who announced they had targeted «20 or 30» militiamen members of the 7 October commando in an operations center. “No civilian casualties,” declared the military spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner, while the United Nations also spoke of women and children among the dead and of 170 UNRWA buildings – mostly schools – hit, with 450 displaced people killed and 1,500 wounded since the start of the war.
Many of the bodies were taken to al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah. «A ship sinking in absolute chaos», Karin Huster, head of Doctors Without Borders in Gaza, describes it with these words, speaking of a health facility already submerged by a constant flow of ambulances since the beginning of the raids on the center of the Strip. An apocalyptic picture, a deadly trap, with the Rafah crossing still closed without it being possible to evacuate the injured, not even the most serious ones.
These are images and news that a part of Europe ready for the polls does not like. From Brussels, the High Representative of EU Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell calls for “an independent investigation” on the raid and Spain, the first European state, joins the case brought by South Africa at the International Criminal Court against Israel, for alleged genocide and war crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip.
From Cairo, where they are trying to negotiate, the word bounces back «stall”. With some glimmers. Yesterday afternoon the head of Egyptian diplomacy, Sameh Shoukryhas received Brett McGurkWhite House coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa and the Egyptian broadcaster Al-Qahera News information has filtered out that Hamas leaders are busy studying «the truce proposal seriously and positively», to arrive at a formal response in the next few days. A small step forward compared to the morning news, when, again from press rumors, Hamas seemed determined to reject US President Joe Biden’s proposal, worried about the possibility that Israel resumes fighting after the first hostage releases. A point which however remains on the table, so much so that – writes the Wall Street Journal — Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar reportedly informed the mediating countries that he had no intention of handing over his weapons or signing an agreement requiring it. And to be firm on signing an agreement on the release of hostages only on the condition that Israel commits to a permanent ceasefire.
From Gaza, to Cairo, to the border between Israel and Lebanon. The head of the IDF, Major General Ori Gordinannounces that Israel has “completed preparations” for a confrontation with Hezbollah. A «limited war» in Lebanon that could push Iran to intervenedescribes it Axios citing Israeli and American sources, outlining a nightmare scenario for the Biden administration convinced that it is impossible to restore calm on the border between Israel and Lebanon without a ceasefire in Gaza.
Also falling during these hours of exchanges of fire between the IDF and Hezbollah was a 39-year-old Italian-Israeli reservist, Refael Kauders, who was killed in a Hezbollah attack in Northern Israel. «I just spoke with the family, active in the Italian community in Israel, to express their concerns condolences on behalf of the entire government», explains the Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani.
And as the evening falls, 17 countries including the USA and others who have their citizens taken hostage by Hamas issue a joint appeal – yet another – asking Israel and Hamas to “accept any final compromise necessary to conclude the agreement” .
