Israeli armed forces intensified their strikes on terrorist targets as Hamas stalled the hostage ransom deal brokered by President Joe Biden and the government of Qatar, the leading Arab benefactor of the Gaza-based Islamic terror group.
Hamas postponed the release of hostages set for Thursday to Friday. “A Gaza ceasefire and hostage release will commence on Friday morning and 13 women and children will be released later in the day, Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesman said,” the UK newspaper Telegraph reported Thursday afternoon.
The terrorist group had previously agreed to free 50 Israeli women and children hostages in return for 150 prisoners, most likely convicted terrorists and murderers, and a four-day cease fire.
Having secured release of its fellow terrorists and halting of IDF ground operation, Hamas is making additional demands, news reported on Thursday suggest. The BBC on Thursday afternoon cited “an Israeli government source” saying that “Hamas has made additional demands to the deal – though it’s not clear what those demands are.”
Almost four weeks into the ground offensive in Gaza, the military is relentlessly going after the Hamas’s leadership and its terrorist infrastructure spanning across the terror-infested territory. “IDF ground troops continued striking terrorists, locating underground sites and striking terror infrastructure in the Gaza Strip,” the Israeli military revealed in a statement Thursday.
With Hamas failing to honor the Biden-backed ransom deal, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi vowed that the military is “not ending the war,” and the ground operation in Gaza will continue until a complete victory over Hamas.
“We are trying to connect the goals of the war, so that the pressure from the ground operation brings about the ability to also achieve the goal of this war, to create the conditions for the release of the abducted hostages,” Lt. Gen. Halevi said in a statement released Thursday’s morning.
“We are not ending the war. We will continue until we are victorious, going forward and continuing in other Hamas areas. I’m very proud of you, you are doing an outstanding job,” he added.
On Monday, “aerial strikes were carried out on over 300 Hamas terror targets, including military command centers, underground terror tunnels, weapon storage facilities, weapon manufacturing sites, and anti-tank missile launch posts,” the IDF reported Tuesday.
The IDF reported the ongoing counter-terrorism operation in a press release on Thursday morning:
IDF troops are striking terror targets in the area of Jabalya. With the direction of IDF troops, an IDF UAV targeted armed terrorists who approached IDF troops and struck an observation post that posed a threat to IDF troops using precise munitions.Furthermore, an IDF UAV and tanks eliminated a number of terrorist cells in the northern Gaza Strip, with the direction of IDF ground troops. IDF soldiers also located a tunnel shaft inside a mosque.Additionally, in an agricultural area in Beit Hanoun, IDF troops located and struck a terror tunnel shaft. IDF soldiers also located numerous weapons and a terror tunnel shaft inside a civilian residence in the area.https://twitter.com/YaariCohen/status/1727690771875123205
Meanwhile, the mainstream media continues to find new ways to smear Israel as the country responds to the horrific October 7 massacre:
The Israeli military arrested the director of the Hamas-controlled al-Shifa hospital after mounting evidence, including medical facility’s CCTV footage, showing hospital staff willingly cooperating with Hamas terrorists.
Al Shifa, Gaza’s largest hospital with more than 500 beds, has been used by Hamas to hoard weapons and explosives as well as a safe haven its terror commanders as they directed attacks on IDF ground forces and order rocket barrages on Israeli cities. A recently released footage by the IDF shows Hamas terrorists forcing Israeli hostages in the hospital shortly after the October 7 massacre in which nearly 240 Israelis were taken captive, and over 1200 were murdered, many of them raped, beheaded, mutilated and burned.
The BBC confirmed the arrest of Shifa’s director on Thursday afternoon:
We’ve now had confirmation that the director of Gaza City’s largest hospital, al-Shifa, is being held by Israeli security services.Earlier we reported that Abu Salamiya had been detained – citing a doctor at al-Shifa who spoke to BBC Arabic – but the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israel Security Agency (ISA) have now confirmed that Salamiya has been “apprehended and transferred for ISA questioning”.In a joint statement, officials say they’ve found “evidence showing that Shifa, under [Salamiya’s] direct management, served as a Hamas command and control centre”.
Iran-backed Hezbollah terrorist militia continues to fire rockets and missiles into northern Israel. With IDF controlling large parts of Gaza, Lebanon-based Hezbollah has stepped up attacks in the north in a desperate bid to ease pressure on its allies terrorist group.
The IDF responded with retaliatory strikes, the Jerusalem Post reported Thursday:
Dozens of rockets were fired toward northern Israel from Lebanon on Thursday morning, with the IDF responding by striking Hezbollah rocket and anti-tank missile launchers in southern Lebanon.While the IDF said about 35 rockets were fired toward Israel, Hezbollah said that it had launched 48 Katyusha rockets in an attempt to hit a base near Safed.Hezbollah additionally claimed that it had conducted 11 attacks, including several anti-tank missile attacks, against a number of IDF positions near the border on Thursday morning.Earlier on Thursday morning, the IDF said it struck an anti-tank missile cell near Zarit and that several projectiles had been fired from Lebanon toward Israel.
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