Israeli troops are operating deep inside Gaza City, both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday, as the war against Hamas terrorists in the coastal enclave entered its 31st day.
“Gaza City is encircled, we are operating inside, we are increasing pressure on Hamas every hour, every day. So far, we have killed thousands of terrorists, above and below ground,” Netanyahu said in a televised address on Tuesday evening.
While the troops increased their pressure on the enemy, despite two late evening barrages, Hamas has fired fewer rockets than it has in weeks. Although the IDF declines to provide statistics of Hamas rocket fire – saying the terrorist group must be kept in the dark about any successes it has – sources confirmed that the general number was far lower on Tuesday than it had been in recent days.
The drop, even if only temporary, was notable both in the number of rocket siren alerts and impacts in the Tel Aviv and central areas.
There were a couple of days of reduced rocket fire during the first and second weeks of the war, but they were superseded by subsequent spikes in launches, so it is unclear whether the reduction is part of a trend.
Most importantly, the IDF could not say whether its invasion progress had led to a reduction or whether it was a temporary tactical move by Hamas.
Hamas firing rockets
In a twist, Hamas said it had fired rockets at Tel Aviv, but no sirens sounded in the area.
Sources indicated that Hamas had fired rockets in the general direction of Tel Aviv, but they all landed in the sea and not close enough to warrant sounding an alert.
In the North, however, Hezbollah continued its trend of increasing rocket provocations, firing a barrage of 20 rockets at Israel, setting off sirens in the Galilee and the Golan Heights.
Initial reports indicated no injuries or damage. The IDF struck back with artillery fire against the sources of rocket fire.
Rocket attacks from Lebanon came not long after the IDF attacked cells of gunmen near the border, as well as shooting down an unidentified airborne object approaching Israeli airspace. Hezbollah and Israel also continued exchanging cross-border fire.
In another incident, the IDF said it attacked a Hezbollah cell which was attempting to launch an anti-tank missile against the agricultural community of Shtula in the Upper Galilee.
IDF artillery also responded to an attack from Lebanon against an IDF post near Aramsha in the Western Galilee with shelling. Jerusalem responded more harshly against Hezbollah on Monday, but by Tuesday was back to extremely restrained and calibrated responses.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Tuesday night that he would not give up on the Israeli hostages taken by Hamas to Gaza and would not allow a humanitarian pause for Hamas, while adding that the IDF would need to maintain an extended security presence within Gaza even after it hands the territory over to a third party.
Gallant would not speculate about who the third party would be, adding only that it would not be Hamas.
Further, Gallant and IDF Spokesman Brig.-Gen. Daniel Hagari continued to threaten to kill Hamas Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar, but declined to set a time for such an assassination. They also declined to set a time for taking over Gaza’s Shifa Hospital, where many top Hamas officials are said to be hiding.
The head of the IDF’s Southern Command, Maj. Gen. Yaron Finkelman, said that the IDF is “striking the heart of Hamas’s capabilities,” in a speech on Tuesday.
“For the first time in recent decades, the IDF is fighting deep in the heart of Gaza City, the heart of terrorism. This is a complex and difficult war and, sadly, there are costs,” said Finkelman.
He added that the main goals of the war are to dismantle Hamas and rescue the hostages.
Additionally, the IDF took control of a second Hamas military stronghold in the northern Gaza Strip, not long after taking over a Hamas division headquarters.
IDF fighters from the 7th Armored Brigade were assisted by the air force, which struck a cell of some dozen Palestinian terrorists before guiding the ground forces to the stronghold, where they seized anti-tank missiles and launchers, weapons, and various intelligence materials. The military also struck dozens of mortar launchpads across the Strip overnight.
Striking in Gaza
Moreover, the navy also operated in Gaza early on Tuesday morning, striking “strategic targets belonging to Hamas,” including outposts containing what the IDF said were “technological assets.”
Elsewhere in the Strip, a terror cell that barricaded itself near the al-Quds Hospital was eliminated by IDF fighter jets, in cooperation with the IDF’s 36th Armored Division. The military said the cell planned to launch an attack on the ground forces from its barricaded position.
The aerial strike on the cell caused a large secondary explosion in the ground adjacent to the hospital, indicating the presence of a cache of explosives and other Hamas weaponry stored in the vicinity of the hospital.
In another event, IDF troops eliminated a number of tunnels, dedicating at least one tunnel destruction to a family member of one of the officers involved.
In the West Bank, the IDF said that it had arrested more suspicious individuals, raising the number of arrests since the war started to 870 Hamas and other terrorist group members out of 1,350 total arrestees.
The rate of arrests has only gone down a little in the last two weeks, while the rate of Hamas arrestees to total arrestees has remained similar.