The IDF was still working to fully liberate a number of Israeli towns and bases and clear out Hamas terrorists from the area near the Gaza border on Sunday morning, as the war between Israel and Hamas entered its second day.
Heavy armed clashes were reported in Kfar Aza, Kissufim, and Kibbutz Be’eri, with Hamas claiming that it had managed to take over the IDF base in Kissufim again.
Around 600 Israelis have been murdered, and more than 2,040 wounded, amid the assault, though that number continues to jump wildly with significant uncertainty in the field. The Israeli Embassy to the United States reported on X (formerly Twitter) that that some 100 soldiers and civilians had been kidnapped to Gaza and are still being held hostage.
IDF Chief Spokesman Brig. Gen. Daniel Hagari on Sunday morning said that the military is in the process of calling up hundreds of thousands of reservists in preparation for an eventual ground counter-invasion of Gaza, the largest call up in decades. In Operation Protective Edge in 2014, the IDF’s ground invasion only took place during the second week of the war.
Despite that call-up there was no timeline on when the counter invasion of Gaza – following Hamas’ massive invasion of Israel’s Gaza border villages Saturday morning – would start.
The sense from Hagari was that the focus Sunday would still be completing retaking control of any of the 22 villages and 29 entry points which Hamas used to invade Israel a day earlier.
Hagari said that there were no more active known hostage situations and that the IDF had restored control in almost all areas invaded by Hamas. Despite that improved position, Hagari said that there were still a number of smaller battles and ongoing searches for terrorists who were trying to hide in invaded areas.
He said that tens of thousands of IDF forces, along with special forces, were involved in the Gaza corridor fighting. Hagari expressed hope that within hours, all of the Gaza corridor would be fully cleansed of invaders, though an IDF source had said on Saturday night that this might be accomplished already in the middle of the night between Saturday and Sunday.
Moreover, Hagari said that the IDF had started gradually evacuating civilians from the Gaza corridor areas, but that this would take time. The IDF plans to bring in large numbers of buses for the evacuation, but each village is only being evacuated once security forces are confident that there will not be a group ambush from Hamas terrorists who may have remained within Israel in hiding even as most forces retreated to Gaza.
Early Sunday afternoon, the IDF announced that it had started evacuations of: Urim, Beeri, Nahal Oz, Zikim, Erez, Nir Am, Miflasim, Kfar Aza, Gabim, Or Haner, Ibim, Netiv Haasara, Yad Mordechai, Karmiya, Kerem Shalom, Kissufim, Holit, Sufa, Nirim, Nir Oz, Ein Haslosha, Nir Yitzhak, Magen, Reeim, Saad, and Alumim. Additional villages will be evacuated as the IDF achieves secure conditions for those other evacuations.
In addition, the IDF noted that since last night it has thwarted at least five attempts by Hamas naval commandos to penetrate into Israel from the sea near Zikim beach.
On Sunday afternoon, Hamas spokesperson Abu Obaida claimed that the terrorist movement’s al-Qassam Brigades had sent additional forces into Israeli territory.
In addition, Hagari said that the IDF would continue non-stop airstrikes on Gaza terror command and weapons centers, with the attacks having started in high volumes midday on Saturday.
Over 500 IAF airstrikes target Hamas, Islamic Jihad sites in Gaza
To date, the IDF has initiated over 500 airstrikes against Hamas and Islamic Jihad, including a variety of command centers, tunnels, and 10 large buildings. Hagari said at a press conference that this afternoon airstrikes would significantly intensify and would eliminate all Hamas terror infrastructure, all houses of terror commanders, and all symbols of Hamas’ rule.
Within those targets, the IDF has identified an increased use by terror groups of mosques and other civilian locations to host its military activities, in violation of international law. He said that the IDF continues to thwart attempts by Hamas to penetrate Israel by land and sea, with ongoing aerial and troop operations.
The airstrikes on Sunday targeted the homes of Hamas leaders, including Yahya Sinwar, Fathi Hammad, Nizar Awadallah, and Mahmoud Al-Zahar.
Some 313 Palestinians have been killed and about 2,000 others were wounded amid the airstrikes in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry in the strip.
Terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip continued to fire rockets toward Israel on Sunday, with at least one Israeli critically wounded by rocket fire in Sderot.
Hagari promised that the IDF would soon launch a website with names and faces of killed IDF soldiers, though cautioning that it would take the IDF longer to establish a special call center to help families resolve questions about soldiers whose whereabouts were still unclear.
At his press conference, Hagari noted that Hamas was systematically violating international law when it killed and kidnapped women, elderly persons, and children.
War aims unclear
Hagari was still unclear on what the IDF’s final war aims would be despite an announcement of war aims by the security cabinet a few hours before.
The security cabinet announcement mentioned destroying Hamas’ fighting capability, but was unclear on the question of whether Hamas would eventually be left in control of Gaza and on how long Israel would be willing to fight to destroy the terror group’s armed forces and military infrastructure, including the additional cost in IDF soldiers’ lives and any ongoing diplomatic and public relations damage to Israel.
Although as of Saturday night, much of the world supported Israel’s self-defense operations, in virtually every past conflict, once reports started to come out of Gaza of killed civilians, support for Israel globally plummeted fast into pressure to end its operations.
Hezbollah fires mortars toward Israel, IDF responds with artillery fire
On the northern front, a number of mortars and rockets were fired in two waves from Lebanon toward the Har Dov (Shebaa Farms) area of northern Israel on Sunday morning, with Hezbollah claiming responsibility for at least the first wave of mortar fire toward sites belonging to the IDF. The IDF responded to both waves with artillery fire.
A number of towns and cities in northern Israel advised their residents to evacuate further south, including Kiryat Shmona, Metula, and Rosh Hanikra, among others.
The ongoing war was launched after Hamas fired thousands of rockets and sent dozens of terrorists into Israeli territory on Saturday, slaughtering and kidnapping hundreds of Israeli civilians and soldiers.
The terror group successfully invaded around 22 Gaza corridor communities, of varying sizes, by cutting through the IDF’s enhanced border fence in several spots all along the border, amphibious landings with naval commandos at Zikim, and motorized paragliders and drone-type vehicles simultaneously starting around 6:30 a.m.
Gaza’s rulers also let loose a barrage of more than 5,000 rockets throughout the day, in what amounted to a complete breakdown of the IDF’s intelligence, possibly not coincidentally, around the anniversary of the Egyptian surprise attack on Israel on October 6, 1973.
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