The Israeli military has approved the ground invasion of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, reports said Friday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has informed U.S. Secretary of State Blinken that ground operations in Rafah may begin within two weeks, Israeli Channel 12 reported.
Gaza's southernmost town, Rafah, is bursting at the seams. Nearly the last place spared an Israeli offensive so far, Rafah's population has more than quintupled with Palestinians streaming in to escape fighting. They pack by the dozens into apartments. Sidewalks and once-empty lots are clogged with tents full of families.
Panic and despair are rising after Israel said it intends to attack Rafah next. The estimated 1.5 million people sheltering there – more than half of Gaza's population – have nowhere to flee in the face of an offensive that has leveled large swaths of the urban landscape in the rest of the territory.
Some are just sick of running.
"We're exhausted. Seriously, we're exhausted. Israel can do whatever it wants. I'm sitting in my tent. I'll die in my tent," said Jihan al-Hawajri, who fled multiple times from the far north down the length of the Gaza Strip and now lives with 30 relatives in a tent.
U.N. officials warn that an attack on Rafah will be catastrophic, with more than 600,000 children there in the path of an assault. A move on the town and surrounding area also could cause the collapse of the humanitarian aid system struggling to keep Gaza's population alive.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warned that Israel's planned operation would amount to a "prelude to expulsion."
Speaking at his official residence in Ramallah, Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority which administers part of the West Bank, said that a Rafah offensive would represent a "dangerous prelude" to a policy of expulsion that Palestinians fear.
Abbas accused Israel and its ally, the United States, of "destructive policies."
He called on the U.N. Security Council to take action. "These steps (considered by Israel) endanger security and peace in the region, they cross all red lines," he added.
A military offensive in Rafah, which lies in the very south of the Gaza Strip and borders Egypt, is considered highly problematic.
Such an offensive could lead to a humanitarian catastrophe, the U.N. has warned, saying this would have ripple effects throughout the region.
The city, was home to some 300,000 people before the war, but has swelled to some 1.3 million Palestinians who are sheltering there now, having fled fighting throughout the rest of the densely-populated strip, in some cases following IDF orders.
"Half of Gaza's population is now crammed into Rafah with nowhere to go," U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said in a post on X.
Guterres' spokesman Stéphane Dujarric added after the Israeli government's announcements on Friday that the U.N. did not want to see mass expulsions.
The U.S. government and German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock have also clearly opposed military action in Rafah in recent days.
