In preparation for its anticipated military attack against Hamas, Israel bombards Gaza and evacuates a village near Lebanon

Israel started evacuating a big Israeli town in the north close to the Lebanese border and attacked Gaza early on Friday, striking regions in the south where Palestinians had been urged to seek protection. This is the latest indication of a possible ground invasion of Gaza that might cause unrest in the region.

Heavy airstrikes were reported by Palestinians in Gaza in the southern town of Khan Younis, and ambulances bringing men, women, and children poured into the town’s Nasser Hospital, the second-largest in Gaza, which was already bursting with patients and people in need of refuge.

A tunnel and an arsenal were among the more than 100 targets in Gaza that the Israeli military claimed to have hit. The objectives were all connected to Hamas, which controls the area.

Nearly two weeks after their heinous assault into Israel, Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant on Thursday gave orders for ground soldiers to be ready to enter Gaza “from the inside,” teasing a ground attack to overthrow the Islamist Hamas authorities there. Officials haven’t provided a timeline for this operation.

In Gaza, more than a million Palestinians have been uprooted, with many following Israel’s instructions to leave the northern portion of the cut off coastal territory.

As officials sorted out the arrangements for a critically needed assistance supply from Egypt that has yet to arrive, Gaza’s overburdened hospitals are rationing their diminishing medical supplies and gasoline for generators.

In Gaza’s dimly lit operating rooms, doctors used cellphone flashlights to conduct surgery and vinegar to treat infected wounds.

The agreement to provide supplies into Gaza via Rafah, the sole border not under Israeli control, remained precarious.

Israel said that the assistance could only be delivered to civilians and that it would “thwart” any Hamas attempts at diversion.

More than 200 vehicles and 3,000 tons of assistance were stationed at or close to Rafah, but no work has yet started on mending an airstrike-damaged road on the Gaza side.

Israel has evacuated its own settlements near Gaza and Lebanon, relocating inhabitants via a state-funded program in hotels around the nation.

A community with more than 20,000 people close to the Lebanese border, Kiryat Shmona, received an evacuation order from the Defense Ministry on Friday.

Hezbollah, a terrorist organization in Lebanon with a sizable stockpile of long-range missiles, has often exchanged fire with Israel along their shared border and made threats to enter the conflict if Israel sought to completely destroy Hamas. Iran, the archenemy of Israel, supports both military organizations.

Protests have also been generated by the carnage in Gaza across the region, even in US-allied Arab nations. Those protests can erupt once again on Friday after the daily prayers for Muslims.

While stating that the world “can’t ignore the humanity of innocent Palestinians” in Gaza, President Joe Biden reiterated his commitment to steadfast support for Israel’s security in a speech delivered from the Oval Office on Thursday.

Hours after his hurried trip to Israel, Biden said in a speech that Hamas and Russian President Vladimir Putin “both want to completely annihilate a neighboring democracy” and compared the conflict in Gaza to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Biden said on Friday that he will submit Congress a “urgent budget request” to pay for immediate military assistance to both Israel and Ukraine.

According to an unclassified US intelligence assessment sent to Congress, the “low end” death toll from this week’s blast at a hospital in Gaza City was between 100 and 300.

According to the study, which The Associated Press saw, the death toll “still reflects a staggering loss of life.” It said that intelligence agencies were still evaluating the data and that their estimate of casualties may change.

According to the research, contrary to what the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza first said, an Israeli airstrike did not trigger the explosion at the al-Ahli hospital.

Israel claims the explosion was caused by a rocket shot incorrectly by Palestinian terrorists and has provided video, audio, and other evidence to support this claim.

Any statements or supporting documentation made public by the parties have not been independently confirmed by The AP.

Near the hospital late on Thursday, an Israeli bomb struck a Greek Orthodox church sheltering displaced Palestinians.

A church wall was reportedly damaged when the Israeli military claimed it had attacked a neighboring Hamas command and control center.

Palestinian medical personnel provided contradictory figures of the number of injured immediately after the incident.

The Greek Orthodox Patriarchy of Jerusalem denounced the assault and said that it would “not abandon its humanitarian and religious duty” to provide support.

In reaction for the horrific Hamas strike on October 7, the Israeli military has bombed Gaza nonstop.

Even after Israel ordered a widespread exodus to the south, attacks continued across the region, increasing the 2.3 million residents’ suspicions that no place was secure.

Meanwhile, tensions have risen in the West Bank that Israel occupies and Palestinian terrorists have been firing daily rocket barrages into Israel from Gaza.

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, thirteen Palestinians, including five youngsters, were murdered on Thursday during a confrontation with Israeli soldiers during which Israel ordered an attack.

According to the Gaza Health Ministry, 3,785 individuals have died in Gaza since the conflict started, the majority of them were women, children, and elderly people.

Authorities said that 1,300 individuals were reportedly buried beneath debris in addition to around 12,500 others who were injured.

Over 1,400 individuals have died in Israel, the most of them civilians murdered during Hamas’ devastating onslaught.

Around 200 more people were kidnapped. The relatives of 203 captured people have been informed, the Israeli military said on Thursday.

The defense minister, Gallant, exhorted Israeli infantry men on the Gaza border in a ferocious address on Thursday to “be ready” to march in.

Israel has massed tens of thousands of soldiers at the Gaza border and called up some 360,000 reserves.

Anyone who looks at Gaza from a distance would soon see it from the inside, he added. He said, alluding to Hamas, “It might take a week, a month, or two months until we destroy them.”

Some Gaza inhabitants are only eating one meal a day and drinking contaminated water as a result of the entire Israeli siege’s depletion of resources.

The introduction of gasoline for hospitals was still under negotiation between Egypt and Israel. According to Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, a military spokesperson for Israel, Hamas has taken gasoline from UN facilities, and Israel wants guarantees that this won’t happen again.

A UN organization also contributed part of its final gasoline, while the Gaza Health Ministry has begged with gas outlets to provide fuel to hospitals.

Palestinians had to depend on generators when Gaza’s lone power plant went down last week, and no fuel has been injected since the conflict began.

The biggest hospital in the area, Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, received a contribution from the agency that would “keep us going for another few hours,” according to Mohammed Abu Selmia, the facility’s director.