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Israel tanks move in further,
snipers take up positions
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Jets bomb Hamas home ministry
building and school run by Hamas
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Hamas & Fattah in agreement to
dissolve Cabinet and create a new one to include only technocrats and neutral
people
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Supported by tanks and armored bulldozers, Israeli forces moved further into
northern Gaza tightening the siege, set up sniper and observer positions on
rooftops, and jets rained bombs on the Interior Ministry building and a school
run by the ruling Hamas.
Interestingly, while a few residents of the area moved in with relatives and
friends in western neighborhoods, there was no mass migration while relief
workers anticipate 25,000 internally displaced refugees if Israel moves in
further.
The Army took over fuel depots creating severe shortage of flour, pulses,
medical supplies, and fuel. The ostensible Israeli strategy is to focus on
“institutions and infrastructure facilitating terrorism.” Palestinians say that
Israeli troops will want to cut the Gaza Strip into three isolated sections to
exert maximum pressure on Hamas and the militants holding an Israeli soldier
captured by terrorists on June 25th in a daring operation.
Although the UN agency looking after impoverished Gaza residents has extended
its ration rolls to include 900,000 people out of a total population of 1.4
million, this will increase the sufferings of ordinary Palestinians who lack
electricity, water, medicine and food. Most Palestinians think that the soldier
abduction and the ineffective rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel have given
the Jewish state the alibi it wanted for launching a massive military campaign
to topple the Hamas government.
Sadly, the
Fattah President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas are reportedly in
agreement on the
formation of a national unity government which involves the dissolution of
current radical Hamas cabinet and replaced by technocrats and neutral figures.
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