Israeli defense chief resists pressure to halt offensive

TEL AVIV, Israel — Israel’s defense minister on Monday pushed back against international calls to wrap up the country’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip, saying the current phase of the operation against Hamas terrorists will “take time.”

Israel launched the campaign after Hamas terrorists stormed across its southern border on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and kidnapping about 240 others.

In a briefing with The Associated Press, Yoav Gallant, a member of Israel’s three-man war cabinet, declined to commit to any firm deadlines, but he signaled that the current phase, characterized by heavy ground fighting backed up by air power, could stretch on for weeks and that further military activity could continue for months.

“We are going to defend ourselves. I am fighting for Israel’s future,” he said.

Gallant said the next phase would be lower-intensity fighting against “pockets of resistance” and would require Israeli troops to maintain their freedom of operation. “That’s a sign the next phase has begun,” he said.

Gallant spoke as Israeli forces battled terrorists in and around the southern city of Khan Younis, where the military opened a new line of attack last week. Battles were also still underway in parts of Gaza City and the urban Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza.

Israel has pledged to keep fighting until it removes Hamas from power, dismantles its military capabilities and gets back all of the hostages. It says Hamas still has 117 hostages and the remains of 20 people who died in captivity or during the initial attack. More than 100 captives were freed last month during a weeklong truce.

Gallant keeps a framed picture on the desk of his spacious office with pictures of all the children taken hostage. All but two are marked with small hearts, signaling their release from captivity.

Heavy fighting

In central Gaza, an Israeli airstrike overnight flattened a residential building in the Maghazi refugee camp, residents said.

In Khan Younis, Radwa Abu Frayeh saw heavy Israeli strikes overnight around the European Hospital.

With the war in its third month, the Palestinian death toll in Gaza has surpassed 17,900, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.

Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union.

Gallant blamed Hamas for the heavy civilian death toll, saying that the terrorist group maintains a network of tunnels underneath schools, streets and hospitals.

He said that Israel has inflicted heavy damage on Hamas, killing half of the terrorist group’s battalion commanders and destroying many tunnels, command centers and weapons facilities.

Israeli officials have said some 7,000 Hamas terrorists — roughly one-quarter of the group’s fighting force — have been killed throughout the war and that 500 terrorists have been detained in Gaza the past month.

Israel says 104 of its soldiers have been killed in the Gaza ground offensive.

The result, he said, is that in the northern Gaza Strip, Hamas has been reduced to “islands of resistance” acting on the whims of local commanders.

In southern Gaza, he said the situation is different. “They are still organized militarily,” he said.

The military said five soldiers were killed in a battle in southern Gaza on Sunday, after terrorists fired at them from a school and set off an explosive device. It said the troops, backed by aircraft and tanks, returned fire and killed the terrorists.

Forces operating in Jabaliya found a truck full of long-range rockets near a school, and a rifle, two rocket-propelled grenade launchers and explosives in a home, the army said.

Gallant also said Israel has recovered “hundreds of terabytes” of information about Hamas from computers its troops have seized.

Despite the reported battlefield setbacks, Hamas on Monday fired a barrage of rockets that set off sirens in Tel Aviv, where Gallant’s office and Israeli military headquarters are located.

One person was lightly wounded, according to the Magen David Adom rescue service. Israel’s Channel 12 television broadcast footage of a cratered road and damage to cars and buildings in a suburb.

Deliveries of aid

A U.N. and Red Crescent convoy over the weekend made the first delivery of medical supplies to the north in more than a week.

Israel said it will start conducting inspections of aid trucks Tuesday at its Kerem Shalom crossing, a step meant to increase the amount of relief entering Gaza.

Currently, Israel’s Nitzana crossing is the only inspection point in operation. All trucks then enter from Egypt through the Rafah crossing.

Israel has urged people to flee to what it says are safe areas in the south. The fighting in and around Khan Younis has pushed tens of thousands toward the town of Rafah and other areas along the border with Egypt.

Palestinians in Lebanon and the West Bank observed a general strike on Monday called by activists to demand a cease-fire, after the U.S. vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for one on Friday. A similar, nonbinding vote is planned in the General Assembly on Tuesday.

The United States has urged Israel to reduce civilian casualties, though it has provided unwavering diplomatic and military support.

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Shurafa reported from Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip, Jeffery from Cairo. Associated Press reporters Paul Haven and Tia Goldenberg in Tel Aviv, Najib Jobain in Rafah, Gaza Strip, Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed.