-Agency reports
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed his country would “stand alone” if its closest ally followed through on threats to suspend arms shipments over a full-scale invasion of Rafah, where more than one million people have taken refuge.
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Speaking Thursday after President Joe Biden’s warning sparked fury and infighting among his senior figures, Netanyahu said Israel would “fight with our fingernails” in order to pursue its proclaimed goal of eliminating Hamas — with or without the backing of the U.S., which until recent months had been in little doubt.
In a separate pre-taped interview with reality show host Dr. Phil McGraw that aired later Thursday, Netanyahu noted his decades long relationship with Biden and said, “We often had our agreements, but we’ve had our disagreements. We’ve been able to overcome them.”
“I hope we can overcome them now, but we will do what we have to do to protect our country, and that means to protect our future. And that means we will defeat Hamas, including in Rafah. We have no other choice,” he said.
The rupture between the two allies comes as talks stalled in a U.S. push for a cease-fire that would head off a ground assault on Rafah. Israeli and Hamas delegations left Cairo without a deal to end the fighting in Gaza and secure the release of hostages still held in the enclave.
With no truce in sight, Israeli forces have continued to bombard areas of Rafah and conduct ground operations in parts of the city.
Aid groups, doctors, and local officials have expressed mounting concern that hospitals in the overcrowded southern city are being overwhelmed and that supplies of food and fuel are running short even before a full-scale Israeli assault.
Israel says it must enter Rafah to fight Hamas militants hiding there, but the city has been filled with Palestinians sheltering in dire conditions, many of whom have been displaced by fighting elsewhere in the enclave.
The White House said this was at the core of Biden’s message to Netanyahu. “Smashing into Rafah in his view will not advance that objective,” Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Thursday night.
Already, more than 100,000 people have fled eastern Rafah following evacuation orders from Israeli forces, according to UNRWA, with troops carrying out ground operations in the area over the past week.
The Israeli army has ordered tens of thousands of people to evacuate Rafah as it conducts a ground operation there.
Video captured by NBC News’ crew on the ground has shown several homes reduced to rubble amid Israeli strikes, with the bodies of those killed, including children, seen wrapped in shrouds at the Kuwait specialized hospital in Rafah. Doctors there also warned of a mounting crisis trying to treat the injured due to a shortage of medicines and machines, especially after a nearby hospital in eastern Rafah was forced to stop operating due to Israel’s evacuation orders.
The World Food Programme warned on Thursday that “no aid” has entered from the southern Rafah crossing, which borders Egypt, in two full days.
“Only 1 bakery is still working. Supplies of food & fuel in Gaza will only last 1-3 days,” WFP director for Palestinian territories Matthew Hollingworth said in a post on X. “Without them, our operations will go into standstill.”
UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths warned Thursday that aid must be allowed into Gaza through the crossing.
“Civilians in Gaza are being starved and killed, and we are prevented from helping them,” he said, after “7 months of horrors.”
The Israel Defense Forces said Thursday that dozens of humanitarian aid trucks had entered Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing earlier that day, with the IDF saying Israel was keeping the crossing open “despite Hamas’ constant rocket fire toward the area.”
The Palestinian Crossings Authority maintained Thursday that “crossings are still closed and under the control” of Israeli forces.
Local health officials say more than 34,900 people have been killed in Gaza since Israel launched its offensive in the enclave after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks, in which Israeli officials say some 1,200 people were killed and around 250 others taken hostage in a major escalation of the decades long conflict.