There have been reports of disarray among Hamas’ members and soldiers, as several soldiers have deserted their posts and are mingling with civilians in order to escape the violence occurring in Gaza.
ARISE special correspondent Karl Bostic revealed this during a LIVE report from Tel Aviv, and also revealed that the current Gaza war is the deadliest Israeli-Arab conflict in many years.
Bostic said that the Israeli government, in a bid to evacuate the citizens of Gaza from Khan Younis, had dropped leaflets in Arabic and put out interactive notes online dividing Gaza into 2400 zones, showing the places where battles are ongoing, and the places that are safe to live in.
However, he said, “The problem is the telecoms providers, they’ve been disrupted and shut off, so people can’t even see things online. They’re going into complete confusion and chaos.
“They don’t know where to go, they don’t know how to survive. Already, 600,000 have been told to head for the south to Rafah. The problem is, Rafah is already overcrowded, and people are living in the streets, making shelters if they can or finding tents if they can.
“To add to that chaos, there’s even chaos amongst Hamas fighters and members themselves. There are reports that you’re now seeing desertions. Israeli media saying that some Hamas fighters are actually throwing down their weapons and mingling with civilians to avoid any fighting at all.
“You also have the fact that Hamas, they pay the salaries of civil servants in Gaza. They pay the salaries of the police. No one has been paid for two months. There have been reports also of crowds storming Hamas warehouses where food is being kept because there is simply no food at all.
“And of course, the hospitals that you mentioned, 25 out of 36 hospitals are now shut down and closed, and 52 out of 70 primary health facilities are also closed, and now there’s a blood shortage because so many injured people are coming into hospital. It’s a chaotic scene that’s only going to get worse.”
He then reflected on the ongoing strikes in Khan Younis as he said, “This phase has already seen some of the most intense bombardments by the Israelis since the war started. By bombardments I’m talking about aerial strikes, motor shelling, tanks firing shells as well. Satellite imagery now showing that Khan Younis, the second biggest city in Gaza Strip, is now basically almost encircled, surrounded by heavy armoured Israeli vehicles.”
Bostic described the ongoing war as “the deadliest Arab- Israeli conflict since Israel’s invasion into Lebanon in 1982.”
He said, “Unlike past conflicts in which Israel was just exchanging gunfire and shelling Hamas, this time, they want to uproot, they want to remove Hamas entirely. They want to basically disable them, their infrastructure, and that means going after their tunnel infrastructure.”
He also said that there are reports from the US media that Israel, as an option, has begun to install pumping stations in Gaza to begin flooding Hamas’ network of tunnels, as they believe that is where the Hamas leadership has fled to and is now hiding in, as well as the hostages they have with them.
Ozioma Samuel-Ugwuezi
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