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

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.

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."

IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi stated during a cabinet meeting on Sunday morning that the IDF had approved operative plans for a ground offensive in Rafah and would present them as needed. "I prefer not to get into the details here. The media discourse on the topic gets in our way," said Halevi.

Planned Rafah offensive driving US and Israel apart

The plans to launch a ground offensive in Rafah have reportedly sparked disagreements between the US and Israel, with a senior Biden administration official telling NBC News on Sunday that there is a growing divide between the US and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Biden attends a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as he visits Israel amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, October 18, 2023. (credit: REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/File Photo)

According to The Washington Post, Biden and his top aides are at odds with Netanyahu and no longer view him as a productive partner who can be influenced in private.

While Biden has been hesitant to make his frustrations with Netanyahu public, he is slowly warming to the idea, sources familiar with conversations between Biden and his aides told the Washington Post.

US President Joe Biden will speak with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday, two White House officials said, in what will be the two leaders' first conversation since Biden said Israel's military response in Gaza has been "over the top."

Biden, who is spending the weekend at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, is slated to speak with Netanyahu on Sunday morning, one of the officials said.

A Palestinian woman who was released from jail as part of the ceasefire and hostage release deal in November was caught by Border Police attempting to sneak into Israel while using another person's Israeli ID card on Friday, Israel Police announced on Sunday.

The woman was stopped while driving through the Az-Za'ayyem crossing near Jerusalem when police noticed that she was trying to identify herself using an ID card that did not belong to her.

The police questioned the woman and discovered that she was a female suspect affiliated with Hamas who had been arrested in October for participating in riots and throwing stones at Israeli forces. During the riots, she was shot in the leg.

Released suspect published content supporting October 7 massacre

The suspect published content encouraging and supporting the October 7 massacre and was released from jail as part of the fifth round of prisoner releases during the ceasefire and hostage release deal reached in November.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview aired on Sunday that "enough" of the 132 remaining Israeli hostages held in Gaza are alive to justify Israel's ongoing war in the region.

Asked how many of the hostages are still alive, Netanyahu said "enough to warrant the kind of efforts that we're doing.

"We're going to try to do our best to get all those who are alive back and, frankly, also the bodies of the dead," he said in the interview with ABC's "This Week" program.

Netanyahu also said that one Palestinian civilian has been killed for every Hamas fighter killed in Gaza.

In contrast, the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza claims that about 28,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, have been killed in the region since the conflict began in October.

Hamas does not differentiate between combatants and civilians

Hamas, in reporting the death toll in Gaza, does not differentiate between combatants and civilians. Early this month, the IDF said it had killed 10,000 Hamas terrorists and wounded another 10,000.

Hamas terrorists killed 1,200 Israelis and took around 250 hostages back to Gaza in an October 7 assault that triggered the conflict.

After more than four months of war triggered by the October 7 Hamas massacre in southern Israel, it’s all come down to Rafah.

Since Israel invaded Gaza, more than 200 soldiers have died, the IDF has killed over 8,000 Hamas members, according to their assessment, and another 15,000-20,000 Palestinian civilians have been killed, according to Hamas estimates.

However, the twin goals of eliminating the Hamas leadership and securing the release of the remaining hostages who were kidnapped on October 7 have not been achieved.

A move that could lead to a humanitarian disaster

Depending on who is talking, taking on the last Hamas stronghold in Gaza will end the war or create the ultimate humanitarian disaster. Perhaps both simultaneously.

Most of the Gazans who have fled their homes in the North have made their way to Rafah, the place where the IDF directed them to seek refuge. Now, if the IDF is to invade, those refugees, along with the 17,000-odd residents of the city, will again have to flee.

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.

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."

IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi stated during a cabinet meeting on Sunday morning that the IDF had approved operative plans for a ground offensive in Rafah and would present them as needed. "I prefer not to get into the details here. The media discourse on the topic gets in our way," said Halevi.

Planned Rafah offensive driving US and Israel apart

The plans to launch a ground offensive in Rafah have reportedly sparked disagreements between the US and Israel, with a senior Biden administration official telling NBC News on Sunday that there is a growing divide between the US and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Biden attends a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as he visits Israel amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, October 18, 2023. (credit: REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/File Photo)

According to The Washington Post, Biden and his top aides are at odds with Netanyahu and no longer view him as a productive partner who can be influenced in private.

While Biden has been hesitant to make his frustrations with Netanyahu public, he is slowly warming to the idea, sources familiar with conversations between Biden and his aides told the Washington Post.

Before the hostilities from across the northern border, Sharrin Hasid, a Jerusalem school teacher, and mother of four children ages 8 to 13, had never worked in a hotel in her life, although her family owns a relatively new hotel in the capital. 

The Theatron, which most people don’t know exactly how to pronounce, opened last June. A luxury boutique hotel, it is still in its running-in period. It usually takes more than a year for a hotel to become known and to establish a clientele of returning guests.

Well known in Jerusalem as builders of luxury apartment complexes, the Hasid Brothers had never built a hotel before, much less owned one. However, they felt that a hotel opposite the Jerusalem Theater, from which it derived its name, would be a good investment because the Jerusalem Theater hosts international and intercity events, and both patrons and performers at such events would find it convenient to have a hotel so close at hand.

They also built an apartment complex alongside the hotel – a practice that is becoming increasingly popular in Jerusalem.

They never anticipated that the hotel would be fully occupied by evacuees.

A floating hospital sent by the United Arab Emirates will dock at El Arish in Egypt in the coming days to provide medical treatment to patients from Gaza, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) said on Sunday.

A floating hospital sent by the UAE will dock at El Arish in Egypt in the coming days, designated to treat patients and bolster the medical response in Gaza.
The vessel includes 100 beds and a staff of over 100 in various specialties in addition to nursing and support professions pic.twitter.com/o1ubGYHsvh

— COGAT (@cogatonline) February 11, 2024

The floating hospital includes 100 beds and over 100 staff members from various specialties.

Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip over the past 96 hours have killed two Israeli hostages and seriously injured eight others, Hamas's armed wing, the Al Qassam Brigades, said on Sunday over the group's Telegram channel.

"Their conditions are becoming more dangerous in light of the inability to provide them with appropriate treatment. (Israel) bears full responsibility for the lives of those injured in light of their continued bombing," the statement said, regarding the remaining hostages.

Hamas terrorists killed 1,200 people in southern Israel and abducted at least 250 in their brutal October 7 attacks. Israel subsequently responded with a military assault targeting Hamas in the Gaza Strip, which, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, has killed more than 28,000 Palestinians. The Hamas health ministry does not differentiate between combatants and non-combatants in their tally.

10,000 Hamas terrorists killed

Early this month, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant stated that the IDF had killed 10,000 Hamas fighters and wounded another 10,000.

During a week-long truce in late November, Hamas freed more than 100 Israeli and foreign hostages in exchange for Israel releasing about 240 Palestinian prisoners.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he has not spoken to US President Joe Biden since the president made remarks about Israel's military response to Hamas being "over the top."

Netanyahu was speaking in an interview with Fox News Sunday.