Israel is waging a psychological war to force Palestinians to leave Gaza and migrate to the southern part of the Strip

Israel hasn’t only resorted to all forms of genocide, including violent aerial and artillery bombardment, starvation, and siege, but has also launched a psychological war to force Palestinians to leave Gaza City and flee to the southern part of the Gaza Strip.

Since the start of the military operation in the city on August 11, the Israeli army has intensified its bombardment of residential towers, homes, and shelters, and has attempted to promote to Palestinians the presence of tents, food, and hospitals in the southern Gaza Strip, urging people to evacuate.

However, the Palestinians, who number over one million, are aware that the southern Gaza Strip is also subject to intense Israeli bombardment and lacks even the most basic necessities of life.

They have refused to leave the city despite the widespread destruction.

Meanwhile, the Israeli Maariv newspaper reported on Tuesday that Israeli military estimates claimed that 350,000 out of a million residents of Gaza City had left for the south.

This is in light of the Israeli army’s propaganda to encourage and push people to flee, as these allegations came after a bloody night for Palestinians in the city, during which 35 people were killed, and others were injured or missing, amid intense aerial and artillery bombardment, and the detonation of explosive robots that destroyed homes and residential buildings.

Maariv, referring to the intense attacks on Monday evening, said that the aim of launching “light bombs was to spread panic among the residents of the Gaza Strip and create confusion among Hamas forces”.

The Israeli newspaper quoted an unnamed Israeli security source as saying: “Previous experience in Jabaliya shows that as soon as residents saw the tanks, they fled for their lives and left their homes”.

Foreign media outlets are reporting information from Israeli sources that later turns out to be false, but they come as part of the psychological warfare Israel is waging against the Palestinians.

Following claims circulated by these outlets about the arrival of Israeli tanks in Gaza City, which according to Israeli Channel 12 who confirmed that the information was incorrect.

Israel is using this news, which is spreading panic among Palestinians, to reduce their numbers in Gaza City by forcing them to leave before any anticipated ground incursion begins.

Channel 12 quoted an Israeli security source as saying: “The number of Gaza residents who have moved so far allows the ground maneuver to begin”.

Channel 12 added: “The Israeli military believes that the significant expansion of attacks will continue to affect the number of residents who will make their way south out of Gaza City, as has happened in other places where the Israeli military entered the Gaza Strip”.

Channel 12 added: “Estimates indicate that even during the fighting, many Gaza residents are expected to remain in the city, but for the security establishment, the number of people displaced so far is sufficient to launch a ground operation”.

According to the Israeli news website Walla, the evacuation of Gaza City is at its peak, as Israeli Walla website said: “According to military sources in the Southern Command, many Palestinians continued to evacuate Gaza City and move south tonight as well, and the IDF estimates that the number of people displaced will continue to increase over the next 24 hours”.

The Israeli website added: “So far, according to Israeli military estimates, more than 350,000 Palestinians have moved south,” adding, “The night before, it was estimated that about 20,000 Palestinians fled Gaza in one night… This time, Gaza City residents didn’t wait for vehicles or vehicles, but walked on foot, fearing for their lives”.

According to Walla, “However, approximately 650,000 residents remain in the city, serving as a human shield for Hamas”.

Walla website noted that the Israeli army expressed disappointment at the number of people who have left the city so far, with estimates indicating that at least half a million people will move south at this point.

However, IDF estimates that when the fighting intensifies in the city’s neighborhoods, hundreds of thousands more will leave.

In recent weeks, the Israeli military has intensified its targeting of residential towers and buildings in Gaza, a policy Palestinian official say is aimed at forcing people to flee the city to the southern part of the Strip.

This came after the Israeli government approved, on August 8, a plan proposed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to gradually reoccupy the entire Gaza Strip, starting with Gaza City.

On August 11, the Israeli army launched an attack on the city, starting with the Zeitoun neighborhood southeast of Gaza.

The attack included the demolition of homes using booby-trapped robots, artillery shelling, indiscriminate shooting, and forced displacement.

Over the following weeks, the Israeli army shifted its extensive air operations and policy of destroying residential neighborhoods to the Sabra neighborhood in the south, then to the northern neighborhoods of the city and later to the western ones.

From that time until Saturday evening, the Israeli army completely or severely destroyed more than 3,600 buildings and towers in Gaza City, while destroying approximately 13,000 tents housing displaced persons, according to a statement from the government media office.