Biden, Netanyahu speak as Israel prepares for invasion of Gaza's Rafah

Jordan's King Abdullah participated in an airdrop of humanitarian aid to Gaza, state-owned Al Mamlaka broadcaster said on Sunday.

A video showed the monarch in military gear on board a military plane in the latest missions by the Jordanian Air Force to drop urgent medical supplies to field hospitals it runs in the war-torn enclave.

It did not give a date when the airdrop took place.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the main United Nations agency providing aid to Palestinians in Gaza, is facing growing administrative hurdles from Israel, with a shipment amounting to a month's supply of food blocked in port, the agency's chief said.

Israel has alleged that 12 staff members with UNRWA were involved in the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, with a number of donor countries suspending funding. UNRWA has dismissed staff accused of involvement in the attack and launched an investigation.

"We have an environment here which is for the time being quite hostile to the agency but there have been some decisions now which are starting to impact the ability of the agency to properly operate," UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said on Friday.

He said UNRWA had been informed by a contractor that provided handling services in the port of Ashdod that it could no longer continue working with UNRWA, following instructions from the Israeli authorities.

As a result, a shipment from Turkey consisting of 1,049 containers of supplies, including flour, chickpeas, sugar, and cooking oil, enough to cover the needs of 1.1 million people for a month, was blocked in the port, Lazzarini said.

He said UNRWA had informed Turkey of the stoppage. There was no immediate comment from Turkish authorities.

A spokesperson for the finance ministry said the matter was in the hands of the government's legal advisor but offered no further comment.

Egypt has warned Hamas that it must reach a ceasefire and hostage release agreement with Israel within about two weeks or Israel will launch a ground offensive in Rafah, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

While Western media has reported that Egypt has threatened to suspend ties with Israel if the IDF launches an offensive in Rafah in southern Gaza, Army Radio cited Egyptian officials as saying on Sunday that Egypt would not act to prevent an offensive in Rafah as long as civilians aren't harmed.

A source in Hamas told the Hamas-run Al-Aqsa TV channel on Sunday: "Netanyahu is trying to escape from fulfilling the deal by mass slaughter and a new humanitarian disaster in Rafah. A military attack on Rafah means a cessation of the negotiations on a deal."

Rafah has now become a symbol of the war in Gaza after four months in which Israel has defeated most of the Hamas battalions in Gaza. This is because it is now an objective for Israel’s potential next military moves. 

At the same time, a lot of countries are speaking out with concern about a military operation there because of concerns about Palestinians who fled to Rafah.

After Israel’s prime minister vowed a Rafah operation, all eyes are on Israel to see if this will actually happen. Can an operation be avoided with a new hostage deal, and is there more to this than meets the eye? 

Media in the Gulf is now expressing both concern and pragmatism over the potential operation. Western media is more alarmist, claiming 1.4 million Palestinians in Rafah have nowhere else to go. 

A move that could lead to a crisis in the Middle East

This shows what is at stake in Rafah. First, it is the survival of Hamas; second, it also relates to Israel’s demand to get the hostages back and also, there could be a crisis in the region, with Iran, Hezbollah, or the West, depending on what happens in the next weeks.

There is likely another side to this. Hamas needs Rafah to survive. This is how Hamas controls humanitarian aid entering Gaza. Hamas has made extreme demands of Israel for a new pause in fighting. 

Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian is on a regional trip, visiting Lebanon and Syria over the weekend. He is also scheduled to arrive in Qatar. In Lebanon, he threatened Israel but has also spoken in general terms about his strategy. 

It is clear that Iran, the main backer of Hezbollah and Hamas, is seeking to keep both terrorist groups in play against Israel. Currently, there is rising concern in the region about an Israeli operation in Rafah in Gaza, the last Hamas stronghold.

The first stop on the regional tour was in Lebanon, where he threatened Israel and claimed that any war between Hezbollah and Israel would lead to Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “last day.” 

Next, he went to Syria. Iran’s regime backs the Syrian regime. Iran has sought to entrench in Syria. It has also used Syria and Iraq to threaten the US. Iran has proxies in Syria that are armed with rockets and drones. An Iranian proxy in Iraq called Kataib Hezbollah killed three US troops in Jordan on January 27.

An officer from the 603rd Combat Engineering Battalion was seriously wounded in battle in the southern Gaza Strip on Saturday and an officer and soldier in Sayeret Tzanhanim were seriously wounded in battle in southern Gaza on Friday, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit said on Sunday.

US President Joe Biden is “very clear and focused,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told ABC’s This Week on Sunday as he pushed back at allegations that the American leader suffered from cognitive decline.

Netanyahu has been in constant communication with Biden since the Hamas-led October 7 attack against Israel sparked a Gaza war.

The US president also visited Israel in the first two weeks of the war.

“I have had more than a dozen extended phone conversations with President Biden,” Netanyahu said, as he noted that Biden “also came on a visit to Israel during wartime, which is a historic first.

Netanyahu on Biden: Sometimes we had disagreements

“I found him very clear and very focused. We managed to agree on the war aims and many things. Sometimes we had disagreements, but they were not born of a lack of understanding on his part or my part,” Netanyahu said.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks on February 11, 2024 (credit: AMOS BEN-GERSHOM/GPO)

The prime minister and the US President have known each other for over forty years and are considered to be friends despite the tension between them. 

Special Counsel Robert Hur, a former US attorney who was investigating charges that Biden had mishandled classified documents, said that the president would be difficult to convict.

He described him as a "well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory" who was not able to recall to investigators when his son, Beau Biden, died.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Germany's Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock will travel to Israel in the middle of next week, a foreign ministry spokesperson said on Sunday, a trip in which she said she plans to urge for a ceasefire as Israel prepares to advance on Rafah.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his government is preparing an evacuation plan for the more than one million Palestinians penned into Rafah, on the southern border with Egypt. Many have already been displaced at least once and have nowhere left to flee in the crowded enclave.

"The distress in Rafah is already beyond belief. 1.3 million people are seeking protection from the fighting in the most limited of space. An offensive by the Israeli army on Rafah would be a humanitarian catastrophe," Baerbock wrote in a post on X on Saturday.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted that victory "is within reach" and that Israel will bring about the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip, during a security review provided to government ministers on Sunday.

"We are on the way to victory. It will take more time, it's true, but it will not take years, contrary to what they say. It is within reach. It's a hard battle, but a battle in which we are winning," said Netanyahu.

"We actually want to bring about the demilitarization of the Strip. This requires our security control and supreme security responsibility over the entire area west of Jordan, including the Gaza Strip. There is no substitute for this in the foreseeable future. We say this to the international community, to the US president, to all the leaders. There is no substitute for that," stressed the prime minister.