Israeli military on Gaza City outskirts, two dead hostages recovered
The Israeli military is engaged in “preparatory operations” on the outskirts of Gaza City, an army spokesman said on Friday, as Israel appeared ready to begin its planned offensive despite fears of a humanitarian catastrophe.
The military is operating “with great intensity” in the outskirts of Gaza City, Avichay Adraee, the Israeli military’s Arabic spokesman, wrote on X.
Israel is planning to fully capture Gaza City, though it has said it will relocate the roughly 1 million people who are in the city to the southern Gaza Strip.
But with Israeli forces appearing to be closing in, aid groups say it remains unclear how this feat can be achieved without putting civilians at risk of harm or starvation.
Palestinian residents told dpa that the Israeli army ramped up its attacks on Friday.
At least 48 people were killed, including 20 in northern Gaza, according to medical sources. It was not possible to independently verify the claims.
“We will increase our attacks,” the army spokesman continued, adding that the aim of the operations was to secure the release of all hostages still held in Gaza as well as the elimination of the Palestinian militant organization Hamas.
Weiss remembered for his ‘noble spirit’
Also on Friday, Israeli forces recovered the bodies of two hostages and brought them back from the Gaza Strip.
One of the victims was identified as Ilan Weiss, an Israeli who was killed on October 7, 2023, during the Hamas massacre which sparked the Gaza war, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement from his office.
The identity of the second individual has not yet been disclosed, with the remains being identified.
A total of 48 hostages are still being held in the Gaza Strip, 20 of whom are believed to be alive.
“Ilan showed courage and noble spirit when he fought the terrorists on that dark day. In his death, he gave life,” Israeli President Isaac Herzog said in a statement as he expressed his condolences to Weiss’s family.
DW accuses Israel
Meanwhile, over on the West Bank, the Israeli military has been accused of targeting Deutsche Welle (DW) reporters, according to Germany’s international broadcaster.
“A DW team was threatened with weapons and fired on with tear gas by Israeli soldiers while filming in Ramallah, despite wearing clearly marked ‘PRESS’ gear,” the broadcaster said in a statement.
The reporters were exposed to tear gas but remained unharmed. The Israeli military has so far not commented on the incident.
In July, DW reported that two of its employees were attacked by Israeli settlers in the West Bank. The correspondent and her cameraman were pelted with stones but managed to escape unharmed.
“The repeated attacks on our journalists in the West Bank are absolutely unacceptable,” DW director general Peter Limbourg said.
“There is no justification for threatening press representatives – neither by the military nor by radical settlers.”
Israel’s military on Friday also confirmed a report that soldiers recently detained and interrogated a Palestinian man with a heart condition who is married to a Jewish Israeli woman.
According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, the man was held for four days “without suspicion or an arrest warrant” having been picked up in the West Bank in a row over an underground chamber which he said was a sewage pit.
