Residents of Khan Younis, in southern Gaza about 10 km from the Rafah crossing, told The Associated Press today that the IDF is dropping leaflets warning Palestinians to flee parts of southern Gaza. The leaflets warn that anyone in the vicinity of “terrorists” or their positions “is putting his life in danger.” Similar leaflets were dropped over northern Gaza for weeks ahead of the ground invasion there, reported Times of Israel.
As AP reported yesterday, the problem is that any such attack on the south will make the humanitarian crisis, already servere, orders of magnitude worse. AP notes that Israeli leaders have largely dismissed international concerns about the rising death toll and deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza and have vowed to press ahead until Hamas is destroyed. That means a push into southern Gaza, where Hamas’ military infrastructure—including thousands of fighters and an underground tunnel network—is believed to be intact. Officials also suspect that Hamas’s top commanders could be hiding in the area.
“There is no place in Gaza that we will not reach,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Israeli troops along the Gaza border on Nov. 15. “There is no hiding, no shelter, no refuge for the murderers of Hamas.”
