US intelligence takes stock of the destruction in Gaza
According to Israel's head of government, the war in the Gaza Strip will continue for many months to come. The infrastructure and residential buildings in the densely populated area have already been largely destroyed by the fighting in recent months. This is according to a US intelligence document.
Almost three months after the start of the Gaza war between Israel and the Islamist Hamas, the coastal strip is marked by enormous destruction. According to the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), by mid-December alone, Israel's army had dropped 29,000 bombs on the sealed-off coastal area, which is barely larger than Munich. According to the ODNI report, quoted by the "Wall Street Journal", almost 70 percent of the 439,000 houses and apartments in the Gaza Strip have been damaged and destroyed.
The US newspaper further reports, citing a World Bank analysis, that as of December 12, 77 percent of health facilities, 72 percent of municipal facilities such as parks, courts and libraries, 68 percent of telecommunications infrastructure and 76 percent of commercial areas had been damaged or destroyed by the war, including the near-total destruction of the industrial zone in northern Gaza.
"The word 'Gaza' will go down in history like Dresden and other famous cities that were bombed," the newspaper quoted Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, as saying. According to the UN Office of Emergency Relief, more than 1.9 million people are now internally displaced, or around 85 percent of the population. The number of Palestinians killed and identified in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war has risen to 21,672, according to the Hamas-controlled health authority in Gaza.
Netanyahu: War will continue for months
Israel repeatedly emphasizes that it is at war with the terrorist organization Hamas and not with the civilians in the Gaza Strip. Measures are being taken to prevent the deaths of civilians. For example, residents are asked to leave affected areas before attacks. Hamas uses civilians as human shields and civilian buildings to conceal entrances to underground tunnels. According to Israel, a number of Hamas terrorists are hiding in such tunnels and are also holding hostages from Israel there.
The war was triggered by the worst massacre in Israel's history on October 7, in which terrorists from Hamas and other extremist groups murdered around 1,200 people in Israel and abducted around 240 others in the Gaza Strip. Israel responded with massive air strikes and a ground offensive. The government's goal is the complete destruction of Hamas. According to Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the military is about to intensify the fighting once again. "The war will continue for many months", Netanyahu said on Saturday, according to a statement from his office.
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Source: www.ntv.de
