What is Happening in Israel and Gaza Today 17 May, 2021.
Israel news today: Israel carries out the deadliest airstrike on Gaza as fighting with Hamas. The Israeli bombings in Gaza are by now the lowest of the conflict. Overnight, 54 fighter jets, mostly customized American F-16s, attacked nearly 10 miles of tunnels. They say Hamas uses them to launch rockets at Israeli cities. Ten missiles in the past seven days alone. Palestinian civilians are dying.
The airstrikes have destroyed three apartment buildings in Gaza City this weekend in the deadliest attack is so far. Gaza is impoverished and cut off. It has no essential emergency services, so poorly equipped rescue crews could dig for victims with their hands and construction tools. They pulled out dozens of survivors under their homes for hours. And they found more than 40 bodies, two dozen women and children.
Also, read Israel Attack on Gaza Latest News.
South of Tel-Aviv, I spoke to a senior Israeli military spokesman about the iron dome defense system, which has intercepted 90% of Hamas rockets that seemed likely to cause deaths or significant damage. He said, “we struck hundreds of other underground targets inside Gaza. And that’s the one incident where we saw houses collapsing as a result. So we’re looking into it. I want to be clear, and it is not our aim. We have no business killing civilians. It doesn’t do us any good.”
In Gaza, we talked to a 10-year-old girl named Nadine. She’s already seen more death than most see in a lifetime. She said to us, “I want to cry and show anger out of my body. They’re killing people that they don’t deserve to die. They’re just living their open self. They come and kill them. We don’t deserve this.”
Nadine also added, “we can’t do anything. We’re just dying. The American people, stop giving. Stop giving weapons. That’s the way that you can help us.”
Israel still has thousands of troops positioned along the border with Gaza. But they have not crossed in so far and begin any land invasion. One senior Israeli diplomat said that Hamas wants a cease-fire. He was speaking for Hamas there. But Hamas has also said that it would consider a cease-fire, but it wants it on its terms.
Hamas wants to link the situation in Gaza to broader Palestinian claims about the status of Jerusalem. But, both Israel and the Palestinians claim as their capital. The Israeli diplomat said what Israel is looking for is some guarantee. That if it agrees to a cease-fire, there will be an end for sure.
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