Israel Invades Rafah

On Monday, May 6, Israel issued evacuation orders for eastern Rafah ahead of a planned ground invasion, and later that night, began to invade Rafah. On the morning of May 7, Israeli forces captured the Rafah crossing.

Because of the ongoing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza, over 1.2 million people are currently seeking refuge in Rafah—a ground invasion puts them all in jeopardy.

Hamas issued a call to “the American administration and the international community to pressure the occupation to stop this escalation that threatens the lives of hundreds of thousands of displaced civilians in Rafah and throughout the Gaza Strip.”

“This crime, which comes immediately after Hamas’s announcement of its agreement to the mediators’ proposal, confirms the occupation’s intention to disrupt mediation efforts to cease fire and release prisoners, for the personal interests of Netanyahu and his extremist government, and in [the] execution of the genocide and displacement plan carried out by the extremist right-wing zionist [government] led by the war criminal Netanyahu,” the resistance organization stated.

The White House urged against a ground invasion of Rafah, although continues to send massive amounts of aid and weapons to Israel unconditionally. The entire international community also urged against such an invasion, including the global movement in solidarity with Palestine.

May 6 also marks Holocaust Remembrance Day. Many have denounced the escalation of the genocide against Palestinians on a day to remember one of the worst genocides in human history.