Humanitarian groups plea for safe corridors out of Gaza as supplies of food, fuel and medicine blocked
War has claimed at least 1,900 lives since the weekend; crossing between Gaza and Egypt shut down
The latest:
- Canada to begin airlift of Canadians out of Israel
- War's death toll reaches at least 1,900 on both sides
- Israeli PM vows a response that will 'reverberate for generations'
- UN, aid organizations plead for humanitarian corridors to help Palestinian people
- Hamas fires on Tel Aviv and Ashkelon
- Biden speaks with Netanyahu, sends secretary of state to Israel
Israeli warplanes pounded the Gaza Strip Tuesday, reducing buildings to rubble and sending people scrambling to find safety in the tiny, sealed-off territory now suffering severe retaliation for the deadly weekend attack by Hamas militants.
The strikes came after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed retaliation against the Islamic militant group that would "reverberate for generations."
Humanitarian groups pleaded for the creation of corridors to get aid into Gaza and warned that hospitals overwhelmed with wounded people were running out of supplies. Israel has stopped entry of food, fuel and medicines into Gaza, and the sole remaining access from Egypt shut down Tuesday after airstrikes hit near the border crossing.
The four-day-old war has already claimed at least 1,900 lives, according to authorities on both sides, as Israel saw gun battles in the streets of its own towns for the first time in decades and neighbourhoods in Gaza were flattened.
The Israeli military said more than 1,000 people have been killed in Israel. At least 900 Palestinians have been killed as a result of the war, the Ministry of Health in Gaza said Tuesday. Thousands have been wounded on both sides.
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Israel said that Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza are holding more than 150 soldiers and civilians snatched from inside Israel after the attack caught its vaunted military and intelligence apparatus completely off guard.
New exchanges of fire over Israel's northern borders with militants in Lebanon and Syria on Tuesday pointed to the risk of an expanded regional conflict.
A looming question is whether Israel will launch a ground offensive into Gaza — a 40-kilometre-long strip of land wedged among Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea that is home to 2.3 million people and has been governed by Hamas since 2007.
In a statement, the UN Human Rights Office called on all states with influence to take steps to de-escalate the conflict, as the organization looks to "keep the plight of civilians at the forefront," Liz Throssell, UN spokesperson, told CBC News Network. "We have seen terrible loss of life, both among Israel civilians and Palestinian civilians," she said.
'No safe place in Gaza'
Rescue officials in Gaza said "large numbers" of people were still trapped under the remnants of levelled buildings, with rescue equipment and ambulances unable to reach the area.
On Tuesday, a large part of Gaza City's Rimal neighbourhood — an upscale district that is home to ministries of the Hamas-run government, as well as universities, media organizations and the offices of aid organizations — was reduced to rubble after warplanes bombarded it for hours the night before.
After hours of non-stop attacks, residents left their homes at daybreak to find buildings torn in half by airstrikes or reduced to mounds of concrete and rebar. Cars were flattened and trees burned out on residential streets that had been transformed into moonscapes.
Mkhainer Abusada, a political science professor at al-Azhar University, told CBC News Tuesday he has never seen anything like it in his life.
"The bombing was so a horrible that it shook the whole neighbourhood," he said. "Building after building after building were extremely destroyed, massively erased."
He said his family has been separated, forced to flee their home because of the bombing, to try to find safe shelter.
"It's a humanitarian catastrophe that is taking place," he said. "The civilians are paying the price of this conflict."
"There is no safe place in Gaza right now," said Hasan Jabar, a Gaza journalist, after three Palestinian journalists were killed in the Rimal bombardment. "You see decent people being killed every day.
"I am genuinely afraid for my life."
Blinken to travel to Israel in coming days
On Tuesday afternoon, Hamas fired barrages of rockets toward Tel Aviv and the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon. There were no immediate reports of casualties. On Tuesday night, a group of militants entered an industrial zone in Ashkelon, sparking a gunbattle with Israeli troops, the military said. Three militants were killed, and troops were searching the area for others.
The events are being watched around the world, with Canada among the countries mourning the death of its citizens while monitoring for possible hostages.
Israel's government is under intense pressure from the public to topple Hamas, a goal considered unachievable in the past because it would require a reoccupation of the Gaza Strip, at least temporarily.
"The objective is for this war to end very differently from all of the previous rounds. There has to be a clear victory," said Chuck Freilich, a former deputy national security adviser in Israel.
"Whatever has to be done to fundamentally change the situation will have to be done," he said.
The devastation also sharpened questions about Hamas's strategy and objectives.
Hamas officials have said they planned for all possibilities, including a punishing Israeli escalation. Desperation has grown among Palestinians, many of whom see nothing to lose under unending Israeli control and increasing settlements in the West Bank, a 16-year-long blockade in Gaza and what they see as the world's apathy.
Getting Canadians out
Global Affairs Canada has confirmed the death of one Canadian in Israel and said it is aware of reports of a second after a Vancouver MP said a man in his riding had also been killed.
Canada's foreign affairs minister, Mélanie Joly, confirmed Tuesday evening that Canada will begin efforts to airlift Canadians out of Israel in the coming days.
My message to Canadians in Israel, West Bank and Gaza: <a href="https://t.co/lbUxpVr66i">pic.twitter.com/lbUxpVr66i</a>
—@melaniejolyU.S. President Joe Biden spoke Tuesday with Netanyahu about co-ordination with allies to "defend Israel and innocent people against terrorism," the White House said. Speaking to reporters later, he condemned the "sheer evil" of Hamas and expressed his horror about unconfirmed reports of torture inflicted by militants on civilians.
"Our hearts may be broken but our resolve is clear," Biden said. "Let there be no doubt. The United States has Israel's back. We'll make sure the Jewish and democratic state of Israel can defend itself today, tomorrow, as we always have."
Biden, in his public remarks and statements since Hamas launched its attacks, has repeatedly emphasized his shock over the breadth and brutality of the Hamas assault. He said Secretary of State Antony Blinken would travel to Israel in the coming days to deliver a message of solidarity and support and to discuss "what additional resources we can give them."
Hamas responded to Biden, saying his administration should "review its biased position" and "move away from the policy of double standards" over Palestinian rights to defend themselves against Israeli occupation.
Senior Iraqi and Yemeni Houthi leaders aligned with Iran and in charge of heavily armed groups have threatened to target U.S. interests if Washington intervenes to support Israel in the conflict.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, cited the conflict as a "vivid example of the failure of United States policy in the Middle East." Putin said on Tuesday that U.S. efforts to forge peace in the region have ignored the interests of Palestinians, including their need for their own independent state.
Israel says southern border secure
Israel's military said Tuesday morning that it had regained effective control over areas Hamas attacked in its south, and of the Gaza border.
"We have secured southern Israel, we have secured the border," Maj. Ben Wahlhaus of Israeli Defence Forces told CBC News. "Our forces are still going house by house to make sure that none of them are left."
Israel expanded the mobilization of reservists to 360,000 on Tuesday in what Wahlhaus characterized as a "massive call-up."
Wahlhaus said the goal was to "completely degrade" the military capabilities of Hamas and rescue hostages but admitted that operations would be complex.
"Our war is not against civilians inside Gaza, our war is against Hamas," he said. "But they deliberately conceal themselves and conceal their military operations inside the civilian environment."
In hopes of blunting the bombardment, Hamas has threatened to kill one Israeli civilian captive any time Israel targets civilians in their homes in Gaza "without prior warning." Israel's foreign minister, Eli Cohen, warned in response that "this war crime" would not be forgiven.
Crossing to Egypt closed
The UN said Tuesday that more than 200,000 of Gaza's 2.3 million people have left their homes — the most since a 2014 air and ground offensive by Israel uprooted about 400,000.
UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, is sheltering more than 137,000 people in schools across the territory. Families have taken in some 41,000 others.
The only access in and out is through the Rafah crossing with Egypt. But that, too, was shut down Tuesday after Israeli strikes raised palls of smoke nearby. A day earlier, the Egyptian Red Crescent managed to get in one shipment of medical supplies.
With files from CBC News and Reuters