The consequences of the Gaza attacks in the first few months of the Israeli-Israeli war on Gaza: a joint statement by Israel and Gazan officials

If that is still true, the officials said Israel could possibly take over large swaths of the territory. That would constitute a strategy that Israel avoided during earlier phases of the war.

In Gaza, the strikes have served as a brutal reminder to Hamas of the destruction that it and Gaza’s civilian population face if the group doesn’t back down. The strikes killed hundreds, according to the Gazan Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, in one of the highest nightly tolls in months. Residents of two Palestinian border villages were told to leave by the military, indicating the possibility of an Israeli attack there in the coming days.

They have yet to read the picture. They believed that they have a lot of power over the hostages. And they thought they would get a ceasefire, and not paying anything,” said former Israeli military intelligence chief Amos Yadlin in a briefing to reporters. To tell Hamas, you are going to pay a high price for not accepting Witkoff proposals, it was the target of the attack.

Phase one of the deal — exchanging a group of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners — was over. The withdrawal from the Gaza border with Egypt of the troops in phase two of the war was yet to begin.

Israel did not have a ground invasion in the near term after launching heavy aerial attacks on Gaza. But they could develop into a full ground operation if Hamas refuses to give up control of Gaza, according to two Israeli military officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak more freely.

Israeli protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the recent clashes with Hamas and the state of the Israeli intelligence agency, as echoed by Israeli media

Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has already reaped domestic rewards from the strikes. Hours after they started, a far-right party rejoined the governing coalition and gave Prime Minister Netanyahu more support in Parliament.

“Personally I don’t think it’s likely Hamas will be ready to give up their red lines,” Mr. Milstein said. I am quite worried that within a few days we will be in a limited war of attrition: ongoing airstrikes but no readiness from Hamas to give up.

Israelis were gathering on Wednesday outside the Parliament building in Jerusalem to protest moves by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that they say undermine the country’s democracy and to call for a renewed cease-fire deal for Gaza to bring the remaining hostages there home.

The convergence of popular anger over both domestic and national security issues comes after Israel carried out deadly aerial attacks across the Gaza Strip early Tuesday, ending a temporary truce with Hamas that began in January.

A sense of national solidarity that was at the center of the war in Gaza is beginning to break down.

Netanyahu has two weeks to pass the national budget or his government will be in trouble and have to hold new elections.

In scenes reminiscent of political upheaval in the country in the months before the war over government plans to curb the power of the judiciary, protesters shut down the main highway into Jerusalem during the morning hours as they marched into the city.

Protests were initially called for Wednesday after Mr. Netanyahu announced that he was moving to dismiss the head of Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, citing a lack of personal trust between them.

That has raised public concerns about the government’s renewed push to reduce the power of state watchdogs and make appointments that critics say are based on loyalty.

The Coalition against Israel’s New War with Hezbollah — A Social Media Message from Yair Lapid: ‘Our Day Is Coming to an End’

The centrist leader of Israel’s parliamentary opposition, Yair Lapid, called on people to join the protests in a social media post on Wednesday morning.

He wrote that the government did not stop at red. “The only solution is unity, not silent, submissive, or fake unity, but the unity of an entire nation coming together and saying: Enough!” Our future, our country is our moment. Go to the streets!

The attack on Gaza on Tuesday was the beginning of a campaign to try and get Hamas to release hostages, according to Mr. Netanyahu.

The new offensive in Gaza also allowed Netanyahu to distract from an unprecedented move: his announcement this week that he wishes to fire his domestic security chief from the Shin Bet agency, a move that sparked street protests, with more underway on Wednesday.

Returning to war paved the way for Netanyahu to bring his far-right ally Itamar Ben Gvir back inside the coalition and beef up his governing majority. Ben Gvir quit because of the January ceasefire, but returned Tuesday with the war going on.

It is practically the same proposal that had been on the table before Israel’s war with Hezbollah, except for the demand to remove troops from the border area.

Israel is trying to get Hamas to agree to terms for a new ceasefire after Trump’s Mideastern envoy presented a proposal for new ceasefire terms last week.

The ceasefire deal started on January 19th and Israel violated it on the last day of the Biden administration.

The specific terms of the deal were never officially published. And though the deal was clinched with involvement from the incoming Trump administration, it was sealed under the auspices of the Biden administration in its waning days. Israel saw itself as having leeway to try to extract new terms under President Trump.

Hamas recovered all the time. Israel allowed for a huge increase in aid supplies. The Hamas government leaders in Gaza began emerging from tunnels and hideouts to show off their control of the territory.

In a Facebook post that was subsequently removed after criticism from Gaza residents, the Hamas-run Gaza City municipality said it was seeking to collect taxes among Gaza residents living amid the rubble of the previous 15 months of war.

Hamas was trying to retrofit unexploded Israeli ordinance from the war for its own weapons stockpiles, according to Tamir Heyman, the head of Israel’s leading national security think tank, the Israeli Institute for National Security Studies.

Israel began a supplies blockade on Gaza this month to pressure Hamas to accept its terms. Hamas engaged with mediators but did not budge from its core demand to adhere to the original deal, remove Israeli troops from the Gaza-Egypt border and begin talks on the end of the war.

At 2:10 a.m., Israel launched about ten minutes of strikes from naval ships and dozens of warplanes after weeks of preparations for an offensive that was kept inside closed circles in the Israeli military. Both officials are not talking to the media because they are not authorized to discuss what is happening behind the scenes.

A senior Hamas official says that the ceasefire talks were underway in the early hours of Tuesday when the Israeli strikes began.

Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen disrupted international shipping routes and fired missiles at Israel throughout the first 15 months of the Gaza war. After Israel resumed the war in Gaza Tuesday, the Israeli military says it intercepted a ballistic missile fired from Yemen toward Israel.

The Gates of Hell have Not Yet Open: a Servant’s War with a Soldier’s Capture and the Implications to the Security of the United States

“Netanyahu’s true objective appears increasingly clear: a gradual slide toward an authoritarian-style regime, whose survival he will try to secure through perpetual war on multiple fronts,” wrote Harel.

The gates of hell have not yet opened? For me the gates of hell have opened today,” Ruhama Buhbut told Israeli Channel 12. There is a man in Gaza who is still being held hostage.

Analysts think that the strikes could last for another two weeks until Israel passes its budget, which will allow Netanyahu to resume a ceasefire more easily and give him a better position in power.

The U.S. strikes were in Yemen last weekend, and the U.S. fighter jets stopped a reprisal on a U.S. ship. President Trump warned Iran, a backer of the Houthis, of “dire consequences” if Houthi attacks do not stop.