The private Israeli Channel 12 said on Friday that international pressure is being exerted on Israel to postpone the ground operation in the Gaza Strip.
Channel 12 added that international pressure is being exerted on Israel to postpone the ground operation in the Gaza Strip until the end of negotiations to release prisoners held by the Palestinian factions, without further details.
On more than one occasion, Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, announced intention to carry out a military ground entry into the Gaza Strip.
On Thursday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant hinted at the approaching date of the ground military operation that the army intends to carry out in Gaza, telling a number of officers that they will soon see Gaza from the inside, referring to the government’s orders to the army to begin the operation.
The Israeli army announced on Friday that the war with the Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip will continue for many weeks.
The Israeli army spokesman, Brigadier General Daniel Hagari, said in a press conference carried by the official Israeli Broadcasting Authority, “The war with the Gaza factions will continue for many weeks, and difficult days await us”.
He added, “We’re working in every possible way to locate the abductees in Gaza and release them”.
Hagari continued, “Recovering all those kidnapped from the Gaza Strip is our top priority”.
He added, “The Israeli Defense Forces are continuing their raids against the Gaza Strip, and everyone who had a hand in the attack on Saturday, October 7th has shed its blood”.
In response to a journalist’s question about the ground war in Gaza, Hagari said, “We continue to prepare for the next steps”.
In addition, al Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas movement, continued its launch rockets on Friday targeting number of Israeli towns and sites, for the fourteenth day in a row.
Al Qassam said in separate statements that it bombed the cities of Ashdod and Sderot, and enemy concentrations near the Mafkaim settlement with bursts of rockets.
Earlier Friday, al Qassam Brigades said in a statement that it targeted Jerusalem in response to Israeli crimes against civilians.
The statement added that it targeted a gathering of Israeli soldiers in the Kfar Azza settlement with mortar shells.
Israel continues to launch intensive raids on Gaza, leaving thousands of civilians dead and wounded, and cutting off its supplies of water, electricity, food and medicine, which has sparked local and international warnings of a double humanitarian catastrophe, in parallel with intense Israeli raids and arrests in cities and towns of the occupied West Bank.
