Middle East: Israel’s army announces expansion of ground operations

Israel’s army has announced that it will expand its ground operations in the Gaza Strip against the Islamist Hamas. Military spokesman Daniel Hagari announced this in the evening on the X platform, formerly Twitter. In the last few hours, the military has increased its attacks in the Gaza Strip. He further explained that underground targets and terrorist infrastructure were increasingly being attacked.

It initially remained unclear whether the announcement marked the start of the Israeli military’s widely expected ground offensive. The Israeli military had previously made isolated, time-limited advances on the ground.

According to Hamas’s military wing in the Gaza Strip, there are Israeli ground operations in two different locations. The Al-Kassam Brigades said there were violent clashes in the town of Beit Hanun in the north and east of the Al-Bureij refugee camp in the center of the Gaza Strip. Both are places near the border. The information provided by the Islamist organization, which is classified as a terrorist organization by the EU and the USA, could not be independently verified. Israel’s army declined to comment on the report.

Media reports indicated massive Israeli bombing raids in the Gaza Strip in the evening. According to reports, the internet also failed in the sealed-off coastal strip with more than two million inhabitants. The Internet monitor Netblocks also spoke of a breakdown in Internet connections in a post on Platform X.

More than 1,400 people were killed in Israel in a terrorist attack by Hamas in the border area with the Gaza Strip on October 7th. More than 200 hostages were kidnapped into the Gaza Strip. Since then, Israel has been bombing targets in the Gaza Strip on a massive scale. The military also mobilized around 300,000 reservists and gathered forces near the Gaza Strip for a possible ground offensive.