The Israel Defense Forces announced it has completely encircled Gaza City.
The IDF began its ground offensive into Gaza last week after several delays. Israeli forces launched a three-pronged attack into the Gaza Strip, with the apparent intent of completely enveloping the highly dense Gaza City, where fighting is expected to be fiercest. The first phase of this plan was declared completed on Thursday.
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“Our troops have completed the encirclement of Gaza City, the center of Hamas activity,” IDF spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said in a Thursday press conference, the Times of Israel reported.
He added that a ceasefire was “off the table.”
The IDF’s move to encircle Gaza City was conducted incrementally, taking nearly a week and a half to move the width of the strip, which is just a few miles. The pincer in the south, moving east to west, appears to have reached the sea, splitting the Gaza Strip in half.
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As most IDF advances have been confined to open fields outside the city itself, favorable to IDF armor supremacy, losses have been minimal — just 17 soldiers have been reported as killed far. In contrast, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed the IDF has killed “thousands of terrorists,” largely through airstrikes.
As fighting nears the urban sprawl of Gaza City, the IDF reported an increased intensity of fighting. The IDF claimed it had killed 130 terrorists in recent ground battles.
