February 10, 2024 Israel-Hamas war

Our live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza has moved here.

British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said Saturday he is “deeply concerned” by the prospect of an Israeli military offensive in Rafah, while EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned it would amount to a “humanitarian catastrophe.”

“Deeply concerned about the prospect of a military offensive in Rafah – over half of Gaza’s population are sheltering in the area,” Cameron wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

“The priority must be an immediate pause in the fighting to get aid in and hostages out, then progress towards a sustainable, permanent ceasefire,” he wrote.

In a separate statement on X, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned that an Israeli offensive in Rafah would lead to an “unspeakable humanitarian catastrophe.”

“I echo the warning by several EU member states that an Israeli offensive on Rafah would lead to an unspeakable humanitarian catastrophe and grave tensions with Egypt. Resuming negotiations to free hostages and suspend hostilities is the only way to avert a bloodshed,” Borrell wrote.

Ahead of a looming ground offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed his military to prepare to evacuate an estimated 1.3 million people in the city, many of whom have already been displaced from other parts of the enclave.

Ahead of a looming ground offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed his military to prepare to evacuate an estimated 1.3 million people in the city — many of whom were already displaced from other parts of the enclave and say they have nowhere to go.

On Saturday, an Israeli official told CNN that Netanyahu wants the Rafah operation completed by the start of Ramadan on March 10.

The United Nations said it was “extremely worried” about Israel’s plan, while Human Rights Watch said a mass evacuation would have “catastrophic consequences.”

Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry warned Saturday of “very serious repercussions of storming and targeting” Rafah, and the United Arab Emirates also issued a stern warning about Israel’s plan, which it said “threatens to cause the loss of more innocent life and exacerbate the humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza Strip.”

Here are other headlines you should know:

Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, take shelter in a tent camp in Rafah, Gaza, near the border with Egypt on February 8.

Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry warned Saturday of “very serious repercussions of storming and targeting” the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.

“The Kingdom affirms its categorical rejection and strong condemnation of their forcible deportation, and renews its demand for an immediate ceasefire,” the ministry said in a statement.

Remember: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has directed Israel’s military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah, meaning an estimated 1.3 million people, many of whom were already displaced from other parts of the enclave and say they have nowhere to go.

Call for UN meeting: The Saudi ministry said targeting Rafah amounts to a violation of international law and “confirms the need for an urgent convening of the UN Security Council to prevent Israel from causing an imminent humanitarian disaster.”

Palestinian police say at least five officers were killed Saturday in separate Israeli airstrikes that struck Rafah, the southern Gaza city where an Israeli ground offensive is looming.

The reports come as Israel claims to have killed three Hamas militants, including two senior military operatives, in the city Saturday.

Hospital reports civilian casualties: Another Israeli airstrike in Rafah hit a house and killed at least 12 civilians, according to information provided to CNN by the Abu Yousuf Al-Najjar hospital in Gaza. More people are believed to still be caught under the rubble.

It is unknown if Israel’s reports on the Hamas operatives’ deaths are linked to those coming from Palestinian police and hospital officials.

More on the situation in Rafah: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has directed his military to evacuate more than a million people living in Rafah — many of them already displaced by Israel’s offensive elsewhere in the enclave.

Netanyahu told Israel’s war cabinet that he wants a ground offensive in Rafah completed by the start of Ramadan on March 10, an Israeli official told CNN on Saturday.

Palestinians in the crowded city have warned they have nowhere else to go.

Israel claimed Saturday it uncovered a major Hamas tunnel hiding weapons underneath a United Nations aid agency headquarters in northern Gaza. 

The alleged finding took place as part of an Israeli military operation in the areas of Shati and Tel al-Hawa in northern Gaza, according to the Israel Defense Forces. 

The IDF claimed in a statement its troops reached a tunnel shaft located near a school operated by the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). It did not say, however, when the discovery was made.

CNN has not independently verified Israel’s claims.

UNRWA head issued a quick response: The organization’s commissioner-general, Philippe Lazzarini, said the agency did not know what is under its headquarters in Gaza and that “Israeli authorities have not informed UNRWA officially about the alleged tunnel,” so they are unable to address the claim further.

The UN agency carries out inspections inside its premises every quarter, and the last one that took place in its Gaza premises was completed in September, according to Lazzarini.

Israel’s Foreign Minister Israel Katz called for Lazzarini to resign after the latest claims of a tunnel beneath UNRWA headquarters Saturday. Lazzarini did not immediately respond.

Some background: Israel has longstanding issues with UNRWA, and the agency fired several employees after Israel alleged that some of its staff were involved in Hamas’ October 7 attacks of last year.

The United States and at least 13 of its allies have pulled funding for the agency while investigators probe the claims. UN officials have raised alarm that defunding the organization imperils its ability to provide lifesaving aid in the enclave.

Gaza is home to a sprawling underground network of tunnels used by Hamas. The group has claimed there are more than 300 miles worth of the subterranean passages.

CNN’s Nadeen Ebrahim contributed reporting to this post.

The Tal El Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City is pictured on February 10.

Israeli operations in northern Gaza left “total destruction,” according to residents in the Tal El Hawa neighborhood of Gaza City, with some saying they have had to drink from toilets due to a lack of water.

Abdul Kareem Al-Qaseer has been displaced for two months from Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza to the “industrial area” southeast of Gaza City, where some industrial factories are located, he told a local journalist working for CNN on Saturday.

Al-Qaseer said the Israel Defense Forces “hit the whole area, (resulting in) a large number of martyrs and wounded people” where he was sheltering. 

“We were besieged. We tried to go back to the north, but we were besieged here,” he said. “Every day there were martyrs. Every day there was shelling. Every day there was hunger.”

Abdul Kareem Al-Qaseer speaks in Gaza City's Tal El Hawa neighborhood on February 10.

Olfat Hamdan said she had witnessed bodies lying in the streets of Gaza City, noting that “nobody was able to drag them or move them.”

“What have I seen? Total destruction — look at of the scale of the destruction,” she said in a video commissioned by CNN, as she pointed to damaged buildings and rubble around her. 

Another Gaza City resident, Main Naim, also said he had seen dead bodies on the streets, describing some as having been there for 10 days.

Main Naim speaks in Gaza City's Tal El Hawa neighborhood on February 10.

“Nobody is able to move them,” he said. “They destroyed these areas, as you can see yourself,” he added, pointing to rubble in the video. 

Fighting has continued sporadically in northern Gaza. Earlier this month, the IDF reported further operations in the northern Gaza Strip, where it said “IDF troops are continuing to enter Hamas military compounds and eliminate terrorists.” 

Israeli military aircraft killed three Hamas members in Rafah on Saturday, including two senior military operatives, the Israel Defense Forces claimed in a statement.

The military said the operatives killed included Ahmed Eliakubi, who the Israeli military claims was “responsible for the security provisions for senior Hamas leaders and served as a senior commander in the Rafah district.”

The statement said the attack also killed a senior military member identified by the IDF as Iman Rantisi, and a third militant who was not identified.

CNN cannot independently verify the claims, due to the difficulty of reporting from the war zone.

Remember: Rafah is a southern Gaza city packed with Palestinians who have been displaced from other parts of the enclave, where Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now directed his military to plan for the evacuation of civilians before a coming ground offensive.

Rafah is the last major population center in Gaza not occupied by Israeli forces, and Palestinians living there have warned they have no place to go.

Israeli fighter jets struck three Hezbollah military command centers in southern Lebanon, the Israel Defense Forces said Saturday. 

Aside from the the command centers, located in the area of Ayta ash Shab and the coastal town of Naqoura, the aircraft struck additional Hezbollah locations in the areas of Khiam, Marwahin and Boustane, the IDF said in a statement. 

Israeli artillery, meanwhile, struck three launching sites in southern Lebanon after they were identified as locations targeting the town of Shlomi in northern Israel, according to the IDF.

Remember: Hezbollah is a powerful paramilitary group backed by Iran, which has engaged in increased cross-border skirmishes with Israel since the start of the latest war in Gaza.

More news from this region: The news of fresh Israeli strikes Saturday came as Lebanese state-run media reported a drone strike on a car about 40 miles from the border. Reuters reports that the drone targeted a Palestinian figure linked to Hamas, but that they survived the attack, according to security sources.

It also came as Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah met in Lebanon with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, who called for a political solution to the war in Gaza.

Men walk along a street ravaged by Israeli bombing in Rafah, Gaza, on February 9.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his country’s war cabinet on Thursday that the Israel Defense Forces operation in Rafah must be complete by the start of Ramadan on March 10, an Israeli official told CNN on Saturday.

Netanyahu’s office said Friday that he had directed the military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah, where there are believed to be more than 1.3 million people — many of them already displaced by Israel’s offensive elsewhere in the enclave.

Here’s what you need to about this and other developments in the Israel-Hamas war:

And here are some of the latest developments from elsewhere in the Mideast:

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian speaks during a press conference in Beirut, Lebanon, on February 10.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian on Saturday called for a political solution to end the war in Gaza and said that Tehran is in diplomatic talks with Riyadh to work on the issue.

“The region is moving toward stability, security and political solutions,” Amir-Abdollahian said in a news conference during a visit to Beirut, Lebanon. “We announced from the beginning that war will not be the solution.”

“The end of the war means the end of Netanyahu and his extreme cabinet,” the Iranian foreign minister added, also warning Israel against further escalation in Lebanon, saying it cannot fight effectively on two fronts.

Amir-Abdollahian earlier met with Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah during his visit to Lebanon.

Remember: Conflict involving Western powers and Iranian proxies, like the powerful paramilitary group Hezbollah and the Houthi rebels in Yemen, is central to concerns the Israel-Hamas war could spread into a wider Mideast conflict.

The US conducted more strikes against targets in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen Friday, according to US Central Command, which said the strikes destroyed weapons that posed a threat to Navy and commercial ships.

The targets included two mobile unmanned surface vessels, four mobile anti-ship cruise missiles and one mobile land attack cruise missile, all of which were “prepared to launch against ships in the Red Sea,” according to the CENTCOM statement.

The US said the targets “presented an imminent threat to U.S. Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region.”

Some context: The US has been trying to degrade the Iran-backed militant group’s ability to threaten shipping in the region.

The Houthi rebels say their strikes on ships in the Red Sea are in response to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. There are fears that the attacks could help escalate Israel’s war against Hamas into a wider regional conflict.

Seeking to avoid a regional war with Tehran, the US has not targeted Iran directly, instead going after some of its most powerful proxies in the region.

Iran funds, arms and supplies these groups to different degrees, but its leadership does not control them directly.

Palestinians look at the destruction after an Israeli airstrike in Rafah, Gaza, on February 9.

Hamas on Saturday warned against attacks on the southern Gaza city of Rafah, calling on the UN and other intergovernmental organizations to prevent operations that it claims Israel is conducting “with the aim of displacing our Palestinian people.”

“We warn of the danger of the occupation committing widespread and horrific massacres in the city of Rafah,” Hamas said in a statement posted on Telegram, noting that the city is housing more than a million displaced Palestinian people “living in poor conditions.”

According to the United Nations figures, more than 1.3 million people are believed to be in Rafah, the majority displaced from other parts of Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has directed the military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah.

In its statement, Hamas urged the League of Arab States, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the UN Security Council “to take urgent and serious action” to prevent attacks in Rafah.

Hamas also called out the US government for continuing to provide Israel with weapons, even as American authorities have raised concerns about a potential expansion of Israeli military operations into Gaza’s southernmost city.

A spokesperson for the United States State Department said Thursday that the U.S. would not support an Israeli military operation in Rafah “without serious planning.”

Palestinians mourn relatives killed in the Israeli bombardment in Rafah, Gaza, on February 10.

Israeli airstrikes and shelling targeting the southern Gazan city of Rafah resulted in multiple deaths and injuries, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa on Saturday.

According to medical officials cited by Wafa, 25 people, mainly women and children, were killed as a result of airstrikes and artillery shelling on homes in central and northern Rafah.

When asked by CNN for further details about reported strikes in Rafah, an IDF spokesperson said, “In response to Hamas’ barbaric attacks, the IDF is operating to dismantle Hamas military and administrative capabilities.

“In stark contrast to Hamas’ intentional attacks on Israeli men, women and children, the IDF follows international law and takes feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm,” the spokesperson added.

There is mounting international alarm over Rafah, home to more than one million people, after Israel said it would soon enter the city as part of its ground campaign against Hamas.

Palestinians with a donkey cart outside destroyed residential buildings in Khan Younis, Gaza, on February 3.

Scattered around a huge crater are the remnants of a life that is gone. Random pieces of clothing and a red makeup bag lie in the mud. Nearby, an English language textbook, bits of broken furniture and a pillow with floral embroidery are jumbled together in one large pile.

The crater sits right in the middle of a residential neighborhood in central Khan Younis, the besieged city in southern Gaza that is the current epicenter of the war between Israel and Hamas.

The city is the hometown of Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, and, according to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), a major Hamas stronghold. It’s also an area to which the Israeli military urged large numbers of civilians to flee in the early days of the war.

Looking around, it’s clear that the IDF went into Khan Younis with full force.

According to the IDF, the crater is all that is left of a building similar to the others in the area. The military said it was flattened because it sat on top of an entrance to a vast underground tunnel complex.

The IDF says the complex has been used by Sinwar and other Hamas officials to hide since the war began and some of the hostages kidnapped from Israel by Hamas on October 7 were held there.

Read CNN’s full report from Khan Younis here.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a press conference with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Cabinet Minister Benny Gantz in the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 28, 2023.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the War Cabinet on Thursday that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) operation in Rafah must be complete by the start of Ramadan on March 10, an Israeli official told CNN on Saturday.

Netanyahu’s office said in a statement Friday that the Israeli prime minister had directed the military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah.

Netanyahu also said on Thursday that the IDF would “soon go into Rafah, Hamas’s last bastion.”

More than 1.3 million people are believed to be in Rafah, the majority displaced from other parts of Gaza, according to the United Nations.

On Friday, Rafah residents and people who had been displaced from elsewhere in Gaza told CNN they were afraid and have nowhere else to go if Israel enters the city in the south of the Gaza strip close to the Egyptian border.

The United Nations is “extremely worried” about the fate of civilians in the city, UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said Friday, while UN Humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths warned: “There’s nowhere left to go in Gaza.”

He added: “Civilians must be protected and their essential needs, including shelter, food and health, must be met.” 

The Hamas-run government media office on Saturday called on the UN Security Council to “convene immediately” following threats from Israel over a possible invasion into Rafah, a city in the south of the Gaza strip close to the Egyptian border.

“We call on the UN Security Council to convene immediately and urgently to confirm its determination to oblige the ‘Israeli’ occupation to stop the genocidal war it is committing against the Palestinians in Gaza,” read the statement, warning of a “catastrophe and massacre that could leave tens of thousands martyred and wounded.”

More than 1.3 million people are believed to be in Rafah, the majority displaced from other parts of Gaza, according to the United Nations. The city is the last major population center in Gaza not occupied by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

Netanyahu on Thursday said that IDF would “soon go into Rafah, Hamas’s last bastion,” and the next day directed the military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from the city alongside the defeat of Hamas, his office said in a statement. He added it was not possible to both eliminate Hamas and leave “four Hamas battalions in Rafah.”

‘Ethnic cleansing’: Mustafa Barghouti, head of the Palestinian National Initiative on Saturday said any attack on Rafah would “lead not only to massacres but also to a wide ethnic cleansing of the population of Gaza, which is part of genocide.”

Human Rights Watch has warned that the repercussions of forcibly evacuating displaced Palestinians in Rafah would have “catastrophic consequences,” adding the Israeli military has a responsibility to protect civilians whether they evacuate or not.

Iran’s Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian met Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah for a discussion on ”the latest political and security developments in the region, especially in the Gaza Strip, southern Lebanon, and the rest of the fronts of the resistance axis,” according to Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA).

Amir-Abdollahian is in Lebanon for meeting with officials.

The leader of Hezbollah and the Iranian FM last met in November last year where they discussed “the existing possibilities regarding the course of events and efforts to stop Israeli aggression on Gaza.”

Some background: Since Hamas’ October 7 attacks on Israel and the Israeli offensive in Gaza that followed, the militant group Hezbollah has engaged in frequent confrontations with Israeli forces on the Lebanon-Israel border.

Iran-backed Houthi rebels have launched a series of attacks on commercial ships and Western military vessels in the Red Sea, a major artery for international trade. And Iranian-backed forces in Iraq and Syria have launched dozens of attacks aimed at US military positions in those countries, leading to a number of close calls.

The US and other international powers have hit back with strikes on the Houthis and other groups allied with Iran.

At least one person was killed and others were injured by Israeli gunfire at the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis early Saturday, the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health in Gaza said in a statement.

“[The Israeli military] is firing heavy gunfire towards the gates, buildings and courtyards of the Nasser Medical Complex,” the statement said. “We fear for the lives of 300 health personnel, 450 wounded and sick, and 10,000 displaced people inside the Nasser Medical Complex.”

CNN cannot independently verify the allegations and has reached out to the Israeli military for comment. The Israel Defenses Forces (IDF) said on Saturday that its troops “continue to conduct targeted raids on terrorist targets” in western Khan Younis.

A frontline hospital: Earlier on Friday, a medical doctor inside the hospital said in a video on his Instagram account that continuous gunfire by the Israeli military was preventing medical staff from moving from one hospital building to another.

In a statement on Thursday, the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health in Gaza warned of a “health and humanitarian crisis” as a result of what it described as an Israeli “siege and targeting,” adding that there are 300 medical staff, 450 injured people and 10,000 displaced people in the Nasser Medical Complex.

A 5-year-old Palestinian girl who was trapped in a car with her dead relatives after it came under Israeli fire in Gaza last month has been found dead.

“The child (Hind Rajab) and everyone in the car were found killed by the Israeli Army near the Fares petrol station in the Tal Al-Hawa area, southwest of Gaza City,” said Khader Al Za’anoun, a Palestinian journalist working for CNN who spoke to the child’s grandfather.

On January 29, Hind had been traveling in a car with her uncle, his wife and their four children, fleeing fighting in northern Gaza, when they came under Israeli fire, according to the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS).

Hind’s cousin, 15-year-old Layan Hamadeh, made a desperate call for help to emergency services that was recorded by the PRCS and shared on social media. Audio of gunshots heard during the call revealed that Hamadeh was killed while making the call.

Two PRCS ambulance staff dispatched to find her also died, the organization said.

Soon after the incident, CNN gave the Israeli military details about the incident, including coordinates provided by the Palestine Red Crescent Society. In response, the Israel Defense Forces said it was “unfamiliar with the incident described.”

When contacted again by CNN, the IDF said they were “still looking into it.”

Clarification: The headline on this story has been updated to better characterize the circumstances of Hind Rajab’s death.

A woman and children sit outside tents sheltering displaced Palestinians in Rafah, Gaza, on February 8.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has directed the military to plan for the evacuation of the more than 1.3 million people the United Nations estimates are in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

In a statement, his office said that it was not possible to both eliminate Hamas and leave “four Hamas battalions in Rafah.”

Here’s what you need to about this and other developments in the Israel-Hamas war:

Where will the civilians go?: Rafah is the last major population center in Gaza not occupied by the Israel Defense Forces and it has rapidly become home to a huge population of displaced Palestinians. Satellite images showed this week how a tent city has swelled in size in just a few weeks. CNN has also previously reported on Palestinian civilians who followed evacuation orders being killed by Israeli strikes, underscoring the reality that evacuation zones and warning alerts from the Israeli military haven’t guaranteed safety for civilians in the densely populated Gaza Strip, where Palestinians have no safe place to escape Israeli bombs.

Here’s what the United States has said: “To conduct such an operation right now with no planning and little thought in an area where there is sheltering of a million people would be a disaster,” Deputy State Department Spokesperson Vedant Patel told a news briefing Thursday. Also, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken raised concerns about the expansion into Rafah during meetings with Netanyahu and other Israeli officials this week, two Israeli officials told CNN on Wednesday.

Non-governmental organizations issue warnings: Several non-governmental organizations have warned about the humanitarian consequences of Israeli operations in Rafah. For instance, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) said the city, which borders Egypt, could soon turn “into a zone of bloodshed and destruction that people won’t be able to escape.”

Hostage families frustrated: With hopes for a new deal to return Israeli hostages from Gaza in doubt, many, including the families of those hostages still held by Hamas, have directed their anger at Netanyahu, who dismissed the terms of a ceasefire and hostage deal put forward by Hamas.

Half of UNRWA requests to deliver aid in Gaza denied: The UN’s main relief agency in Gaza said Friday that half of its aid mission requests to deliver aid in Gaza since the beginning of the year have been denied. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has not been able to deliver aid in Gaza since January 23, agency Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said on X, adding that people in the territory are on the verge of famine.

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI), an umbrella group of Iran-backed militias in the country, says it will resume attacks on US targets and expel US troops from the country.

In a statement Friday night it said that the US, who it refers to as the occupying enemy, understands nothing but the “language of weapons” and that recent US strikes in Iraq including the killing of senior Kataib Hezbollah commander Wisam Mohammed Saber al-Saedi in Baghdad on Wednesday “violated the rules of engagement.”

The IRI will respond with “strikes and broad attacks,” it said, and called on others to join the resistance. It also said it was turning all efforts to “expelling the occupation at this historical state in Iraq and the region.”

At around the same time Friday night, the Kataib Hezbollah militia, one of the most powerful armed factions in the IRI, vowed revenge for the killing of their commander Al-Saedi in a post on Telegram.

“It is the stage of revenge, and liberation and hell is coming,” it said.

Late last month, Kataib Hezbollah said it was suspending its military operations against US forces in the region two days after a drone attack killed three US service members and wounded dozens of others.

The US, however, vowed to respond to the US soldier deaths, and has conducted deadly retaliatory strikes in Iraq and Syria in the last week to that end.

Kataib Hezbollah is not just part of the IRI, it is also part of the Hashd al Shaabi – or Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) – a predominantly Shiite Iran-backed paramilitary force based in Iraq. Unlike other Iran-backed groups around the region, the PMU is tied to the Iraqi government and officially falls under the authority of the Iraqi military forces.

Citizens queue for food that is distributed for free on December 28, 2023 in Rafah, Gaza.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) warned about the repercussions of forcibly evacuating displaced Palestinians in Rafah as Israel plans a military escalation in the southern Gaza city.

“Forcing the over one million displaced Palestinians in Rafah to again evacuate without a safe place to go would be unlawful and would have catastrophic consequences,” HRW refugee and migrant rights researcher Nadia Hardman said. “There is nowhere safe to go in Gaza. The international community should take action to prevent further atrocities.”

HRW said the Israeli military has a responsibility to protect civilians whether they evacuate or not.

“Civilians who do not evacuate following warnings are still fully protected by international humanitarian law,” HRW said. “Many civilians may be unable to heed a warning to evacuate for reasons of health, disability, fear, or lack of any place else to go.”

HRW’s statement comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed the Israeli forces to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah, adding the Israeli military would “soon go into Rafah, Hamas’s last bastion.” 

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks during a press briefing on his priorities for 2024 at UN Headquarters on February 8.

The speaker of the Israeli parliament on Friday canceled a meeting scheduled with Secretary-General António Guterres because of the UN leader’s call for an “immediate humanitarian ceasefire” in Gaza.

“I intended to try and convince, as well as hand [the UN Secretary General] a book we prepared in the Knesset, documenting [October 7] with still images,” Amir Ohana said in a statement. “But yesterday he again called on the State of Israel to stop fighting, criticizing it ‘even if Hamas uses human shields.’”

Guterres said Thursday the level of destruction and number of people killed in Gaza show that “there is something wrong in the way the military operations are being conducted.”

Responding to a reporter who said Hamas is hiding within the civilian population, Guterres reiterated his condemnation of the use of human shields, adding that the protection of civilians is a must even in those circumstances. 

“I even said [the use of human shields is] a violation of international humanitarian law, but the same humanitarian international law is clear that even when there are human shields, there is an obligation to protect civilians,” he said. “In that regard, I think we are abiding by principle without double standards.”

In a news conference held after Ohana’s statement, Guterres’ spokesperson, Stephane Dujarric, told reporters the secretary general’s office knew about the cancelation first through the media before receiving an official notification, adding that Guterres’ statement on Thursday was not new.

An elderly woman sits at the entrance of a damaged house and Palestinians look at the damaged area after Israeli attacks in Rafah, Gaza on February 9.

The United Nations is “extremely worried about the fate of civilians in Rafah,” UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said Friday as Israel began drawing up an evacuation plan for the estimated 1.3 million Palestinians living in the southern Gaza city.

Speaking at his daily news briefing, Dujarric said people “need to be protected,” but added that the UN also “does not want to see any forced mass displacement, of people, which is by definition against their will.”

UN Humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths also issued a statement Friday urging for the protection of civilians.

Griffiths added that Rafah’s population of over 1 million people “have endured unthinkable suffering” and have been moving for months. 

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu directed Israel’s military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah, his office said in a statement, ahead of an anticipated ground assault.

The post was updated with the statement from Martin Griffiths.

CIA Director Bill Burns testifies during the Senate Select Intelligence Committee hearing on "Worldwide Threats" on March 10, 2022.

CIA Director Bill Burns is expected to travel to Cairo for a Tuesday meeting on the ongoing Gaza hostage negotiations, according to two sources familiar with the plans. 

One of the sources said Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani and Israel’s Mossad Director David Barnea are also expected to attend.

Due to a lack of a tent, displaced Palestinian children rest while residing with their families inside a poultry farm.

Palestinians in Rafah told CNN they have nowhere to go if Israel were to enter the city in southern Gaza, located near the border with Egypt.

“We are praying to God that what happened in Gaza City does not happen in Rafah –because if the same happens in Rafah we will have no place to go,” Mohammad Jamal Abu Tour said Friday. “Where are we going to go? To Egypt? Only God knows if they will welcome us or not.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday directed the military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah, his office said in a statement. On Thursday, he said the Israel Defense Forces would “soon go into Rafah, Hamas’s last bastion.” 

Mahmoud Khalil Amer, who was displaced from the Al Shati refugee camp in northern Gaza, said his staying in a tent near a cemetery in Rafah. 

“I am basically sleeping next to the dead,” he said. “It feels like hell, I feel all the pain, we are not living, the dead are better than us,” he said. “They are rested. But for us, our lives are torture, we can hardly get any water, we don’t have any money. The situation is very bad. The people who used to have stable jobs and income are now suffering and their situation is horrible.”

Abu Mohamed El-Helw, displaced from Khan Younis, said that “there is no place left” for people in Rafah to go “unless they open the borders and let us out.” 

El-Helw said people “are tired from the war” and have become “used to” threats from Israel. 

More than 1.3 million people are believed to be in Rafah, the majority displaced from other parts of Gaza, according to the United Nations. 

CNN’s Mick Krever contributed reporting.

Moody’s Investors Service warned Thursday it could downgrade Israel’s credit rating due to the severity of the military conflict with Hamas.

A downgrade could make it more expensive for Israel to borrow just as the country gears up for what could be a prolonged war.

“Israel’s credit profile has proven resilient to terrorist attacks and military conflict in the past,” Moody’s said. “However, the severity of the current military conflict raises the possibility of longer lasting and material credit impact.”

Moody’s said its review will focus on the duration and scale of the conflict — and how it impacts Israel’s economy, institutions and public finances. The credit ratings firm said the review could take longer than the typical three-month period.

In July, before the deadly terror attacks by Hamas against Israel, Moody’s warned that a controversial overhaul of Israel’s judicial system risked plunging the country into further turmoil that could hurt its economy and security.

A man mourns as people attend the funeral ceremony of 3 Palestinians, killed during the Israeli raid into the Ibn Sina Hospital in Jenin, West Bank on January 30.

An Israeli undercover operation on a hospital in the occupied West Bank last month may amount to a war crime, according to five United Nations special rapporteurs.  

“Killing a defenseless injured patient who is being treated in a hospital amounts to a war crime,” the experts said in a statement Friday.
“By disguising themselves as seemingly harmless, protected medical personnel and civilians, the Israeli forces also prima facie committed the war crime of perfidy, which is prohibited in all circumstances,” they continued.  

The experts said that outside active hostilities, “at most Israeli forces may have been entitled to arrest or detain them,” and were only entitled to use force “if strictly necessary to prevent an imminent threat to life or serious injury.”  

About the deadly raid: On January 30, undercover Israeli forces infiltrated the Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin and killed three Palestinian men, according to the hospital and the Palestinian state news agency.  

Dramatic CCTV video captured around a dozen commandos disguised as nurses, women in hijabs, and others, with one pushing a wheelchair and another carrying a baby car seat, as they stormed a hospital corridor carrying assault weapons.  

Hamas said the three men were sleeping at the time of the attack.

Last month, Israel’s Defense Forces chief of staff Herzi Halevi claimed the men who were shot and killed were involved in a terrorist cell planning to carry out a “serious attack” on Israeli civilians.  

The Israeli Security Agency, better known as Shabak, which conducted the raid was not immediately available for comment on the UN experts’ statement. 

CNN’s Abeer Salman and Richard Greene contributed reporting.

A civilians brace themselves for a potentially imminent nsraeli incursion into the border city of Rafah, several non-governmental organizations have issued warnings about the humanitarian consequences for the city.

The Israel Defense Forces will “soon go into Rafah, Hamas’s last bastion,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday. The US would not support an Israeli military operation in Rafah “without serious planning,” US State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said Thursday.

An estimated 1.3 million people are currently in Rafah, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has estimated.

The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC): Rafah could soon turn “into a zone of bloodshed and destruction that people won’t be able to escape,” it said in a press release Thursday. “Attacks in areas where they provide food, water and shelter means this life-saving support will be impeded, if not entirely stopped,” cautioned Angelita Caredda, an NRC regional director.

United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF): The UN agency also shared its fears for the over 600,000 children sheltering in Rafah, many of whom have “been displaced from other parts of Gaza.”

As months of heavy fighting in the north have practically wiped out healthcare and humanitarian facilities in the north, officials are calling for the scant services that remain in the south to be protected.

“We need Gaza’s last remaining hospitals, shelters, markets and water systems to stay functional. Without them, hunger and disease will skyrocket, taking more child lives,” UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell implored in a statement published Thursday.

Iraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has directed the military to plan for the “evacuation of the population” from Rafah alongside the defeat of Hamas in that southern Gaza city, his office said in a statement on Friday. 

More than 1.3 million people are believed to be in Rafah, the majority displaced from other parts of Gaza, according to the United Nations. 

Netanyahu on Thursday said that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) would “soon go into Rafah, Hamas’s last bastion.”

In the statement issued Friday, the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office said that it was not possible to both eliminate Hamas and leave “four Hamas battalions in Rafah.”

“On the other hand, it is clear that a massive operation in Rafah requires the evacuation of the civilian population from the combat zones,” it added. “That is why the Prime Minister directed the IDF and the defense establishment to bring to the Cabinet a dual plan for both the evacuation of the population and the disbanding of the battalions.”

Rafah is the last major population center in Gaza not occupied by the IDF.

Previous reporting from CNN’s Ivana Kottasova in Khan Younis, Jennifer Hansler in Washington, and Vasco Cotovio and Lauren Kent in London.

Israel had bombed Rafah four times and damaged the crossing, therefore preventing the entry of aid into Gaza, the Egyptian presidency said in a statement.

“Egypt — from the first moment — opened the Rafah crossing on its part without restrictions or conditions, and mobilized humanitarian aid in large quantities … but the continued bombing of the Palestinian side of the crossing by Israel, which was repeated four times, prevented the entry of aid,” the statement said.

The statement was issued in response to US President Joe Biden’s remarks on Thursday, saying that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi Sisi did not want to “open up the gate to allow humanitarian material to get in” but he “talked to him.”

The presidency said that once the Israeli bombing stopped, it repaired the crossing to allow the entry of aid into Gaza.