GAZA: Gaza’s first day of relative calm on Sunday came after the Israeli military said it would “halt” daily fighting around the southern route to ease the flow of aid, following repeated UN warnings of famine in the Palestinian territory.
“Compared to previous days, today’s first day of Eid Al-Adha is considered almost calm and calm prevailed throughout Gaza,” Mahmoud Basal, spokesman for the Hamas-ruled Gaza Civil Defense Agency, told AFP. .
He said exceptions included “certain targets” in the Shujaiya and Zeitun areas of Gaza City, as well as Israeli artillery fire at Rafah in southern Gaza.
AFP correspondents in northern and central Gaza reported no fighting on Sunday morning, although they reported shelling and at least one attack in Rafah and an airstrike in central Gaza in the early evening.
The military stressed in a statement that “hostilities in southern Gaza have not ceased.”
The announcement of a “local, tactical pause in military activity” during the day in the Rafah area came a day after eight Israeli soldiers were killed in an explosion near the city in the far south, and three more soldiers were killed elsewhere.
It was one of the heaviest losses the army has suffered in more than eight months of war against Hamas militants.
“Since this morning we have felt a sudden calm, without shootings and bombings… It’s strange,” said Haitham Al-Ghura, 30, from Gaza City.
The United Nations welcomed Israel’s move, although “it has not yet translated into more aid reaching those in need,” said Jens Laerke, spokesman for the U.N. humanitarian agency OCHA.
He called for “further concrete action by Israel to address long-standing issues” in terms of aid needs.
Laerke told AFP Gazans “are in urgent need of food, water, sanitation, shelter and health care, and many live near solid waste piles, increasing health risks.”
“We must be able to deliver aid safely throughout the Gaza Strip,” he added.
The United Nations and aid groups have repeatedly expressed alarm over severe shortages of food and other essential items in the Gaza Strip.
The situation has been exacerbated by land access restrictions and the closure of the key Rafah border crossing with Egypt since the capture of the Palestinian side by Israeli forces in early May.
Israel has long defended its efforts to allow aid into Gaza, including through the Kerem Shalom border near Rafah, blaming militants for looting supplies and aid workers for failing to ensure their distribution to civilians.
The break “for humanitarian reasons will take place from 8:00 a.m. (05:00 GMT) to 7:00 p.m. (16:00 GMT) every day until further notice along the road leading from the Kerem Shalom crossing to the Salah Al-Din road and then north ” – said the military statement.
A map released by the army showed a declared humanitarian route extending to the European Hospital in Rafah, about 10 kilometers from Kerem Shalom.
The announcement came as Muslims around the world celebrate Eid Al-Adha, or the festival of sacrifice.
“This Eid is completely different,” Umm Muhammad Al-Katri said at the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza.
“We lost a lot of people. There is a lot of destruction. We don’t have the joy we usually have,” she told AFP.
Instead of a joyful festive atmosphere, “I came to Eid prayers in mourning. I lost my son.”
The military said the pause had already taken effect as part of efforts to “increase the volume of humanitarian aid” following talks with the United Nations and other organizations.
Eight soldiers killed Saturday were hit by an explosion while they were traveling in an armored vehicle near Rafah, the military said. There, soldiers took part in fierce street fighting with Palestinian fighters.
Military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said the explosion “apparently resulted from an explosive device planted in the area or the firing of an anti-tank missile.”
Separately, two soldiers were killed in fighting in northern Gaza and another died from wounds suffered in recent fighting.
Abu Obaida, spokesman for Hamas’ military wing, vowed to “continue our painful attacks on the enemy wherever he may be.”
Saturday’s losses brought the total number of Israeli military deaths to 309 since the ground offensive in Gaza began on October 27.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed condolences for “this terrible loss” and said that “despite the high and disturbing price, we must stick to the goals of the war.”
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas after the Palestinian group’s unprecedented October 7 attack that killed 1,194 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data.
The militants also took over 251 hostages. Of these, 116 remain in Gaza, although the army says 41 are dead.
According to the territory’s health ministry, the Israeli retaliatory offensive has killed at least 37,337 people in Gaza, most of them civilians.
According to the latest tally, at least 41 people died in the last 24 hours.
Egyptian, Qatari and American mediators have been calling for a new truce in Gaza, so far without success.
The only previous truce lasted a week in November and resulted in the release of many hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli prisons, while increased aid flowed into Gaza.
Hamas has insisted on a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and a permanent ceasefire – demands that Israel has repeatedly rejected.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Israel supports the latest plan, but Netanyahu, whose far-right coalition partners strongly oppose a ceasefire, has not publicly endorsed it.
Israel’s hardline National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said Sunday that the humanitarian pause announced by the military is part of a “crazy and delusional approach.”
In early November, the United States announced that Israel had agreed to a four-hour humanitarian pause. As COGAT, the body of the Israeli Ministry of Defense responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, reported at the time, one of such pauses took place on December 14.
