Gaza City Archives - Page 4 of 15

Trump and The Oil Jar

CrossFireArabia
October 8, 2025

A long time ago when our mom wanted to send us to sleep she would always tell us the story of the ‘oil jar’.

She would start by saying: Should I tell you about the oil jar? We’d say in one voice: Yes, tell us. She would repeat: Should I tell you it or not…the story of the oil can and we would plead again: Yes. But every time, the affirmation would sink lower as we would yawn incessantly till we fell sleep.

https://www.addustour.com/articles/1521982

As we grew up we found there was no story to tell, she would repeat the oil jar tale so that we forget and go to sleep. I remember the story as I follow the news on the Trump’s mysterious 20-point plan on Gaza; there is no point among the 20 that are clear except the one on the handover of the hostages. The rest need astrologers and psychologists to decipher.

And there are others that say the plan is a “Trumpian trap” coordinated with Benjamin Netanyahu to free the hostages from the grip of Hamas while there there is no exact date for the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, no time detail for the entry of aid to the enclave to help the starving people and most important there are no guarantees to the Palestinian side that everything would be ok.

The only guarantee is that of Trump; there is no UN, no Russia, no China, the biggest powers on the international scene. There is no Security Council whose Article 7 emphasizes the use of military force against the party that opposes the execution of the agreement.

Unfortunately, the US president is not a man of his word. He says something and says the exact opposite the same day and even in the same sentence. This what is the meaning of “peace through strength?” We understand that peace is derived through negotiations; And what about the meaning of “Hamas must agree are face the gates of hell”.

Gaza has experienced: Trump has not kept to his promises for when the US hostage Eidan Alexander was released last May Trump praised the Hamas step, regarding it as a goodwill gesture towards the US. He saw the release as a “historic day” on the way to end the barbaric war on Gaza.

But what happened to this historic day as described by the US president? The Netanyahu government become a wild beast with the Israeli army killing on average 100 Palestinians a day and with those injured double that number not to say anything about the starvation of tens of thousands.

The Israeli army increased its force on the enclave, invaded Gaza City and today it controls 80 percent of the enclave. We have no choice but to pretend that we believe in Trump and see what’s going to happen next and have to wait to see the outcome of his statements as the fairytale about the oil jar.

This opinion was written by originally written in Arabic.

Opinion

Gaza City, Israeli Lies

CrossFireArabia
September 21, 2025

By Dr Marwan Asmar

The current Israeli military onslaught on Gaza is so fierce that hundreds of thousands of Palestinian have already left the downtrodden city. It is a ramshackle place that is once again becoming a ghost town of debris as once-plush residential towers are now beaten down by Israeli bombs with the stench of gun-powder and sick human flesh that lies hidden below the rubble.

Israel’s latest attempt to invade Gaza City started on 16 September, 2025 and since then it has been bombing the once-dazzling urban conurbation from the air, land, and sea, causing widespread destruction and significant civilian casualties, whilst creating yet another mad wave of displacement to the south of the Strip.

Figures of forced displacement are not precise but the city a, conglomerate of 1.3 million people, has been reduced by much less. The Israeli army likes to boost of its handiwork. After the first week of ariel bombardment, it said 40 percent of the population has left, and today it says that 450,000 people have gone. The Gaza Media Office puts the number at only 270,000.

Despite the Israeli leaflets dropped from the air telling people to leave Palestinian sources still say that around 900,000 are staying put. Many say they are not going anywhere because of the limited space down in the south, and the fact it costs $3000 dollars to get down there, something which they don’t have.

One put it bluntly and callously, accepting fate as it comes. “Since, we are going to die anyway through Israeli bombs, it’s better to die here,” he added. The acceptance of fate however may be related to the fact that some of the people may have moved up to 20 times since the war started on Gaza soon after 7 October, 2023.

Last Thursday, World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that the Israeli assault, currently centred on Gaza City, is “driving new waves of displacement, forcing traumatised families into an ever-shrinking area unfit for human dignity”.

“The injured and people with disabilities cannot move to safety, which puts their lives in grave danger,” Tedros said. “We call for an immediate end to these inhumane conditions. “We call for an immediate end to these inhumane conditions. We call for a ceasefire.”

Case stories of thick swarves of displaced people speak of hellish conditions as they can be seen on the Al Rasheed Road connecting the north of the Gaza Strip to its southern side. If people can afford they can use transport but many, including whole families of men, women and children are moving on foot, hungry, with no water and many collapsing on the road as some have been moving for hours on end. For night rest, they make do with resting their limbs, again with no food on the sides of the road.

The social media have been rife with stories about forcibly displaced Palestinians on the road. Many of them say they don’t know where they are going, although the end of the road is to Al Mowasi, an area to the southwest of Khan Younis and which the Israeli has designated as a “safe” place but which it keeps bombing from the air whenever it feels like it.

One elderly man called Abu Nader Siam, walks slowly holding a cane in his right hand with his wife, Zakia Siam, at his left. He is exhausted as reported in the UN News.

“I come from the Tal al-Hawa neighborhood in Gaza City. They [Israelis] have left no house or neighbourhood except to bomb it,” he said. “The shelling continues, and they have dropped leaflets ordering us to evacuate. We walked for six hours because we couldn’t find a car or any transportation.”

Zakia Siam spoke about their non-stop journey after the shelling reduced their house to rubble. “We went to the Shujaiya neighbourhood, and then we were displaced to the Sha’af neighbourhood in Gaza City before it was bombed,” his wife said.

“Afterwards, we went to the seashore west of Gaza City and my husband and I stayed there for two nights without a tent. We sat on the sidewalk next to the tents and hid next to one of them, then continued walking.”

Another civilian, Mrs. Um Shadi al-Ashkar, carried a bag of belongings as she headed for southern Gaza. “There is death, shelling, bombing and destruction of houses (in Gaza City),” she said.

“Even if they had dropped leaflets, if there had been no shelling, no one would have left Gaza City, they would have stayed in their homes. But there is death and devastation.”

The fight for Gaza city is in full-swing. The Israeli army knows what its up against, adding it could take months, or even up to a year to completely take over the city from Palestinian resistance groups. Meanwhile, they know the city is a Hamas stronghold which they can’t railroad through their tanks. That is why for the time being they put the ground invasion on hold and bombing the city from the air and sea.

News

Israel Kills Pregnant Woman, Unborn Child

CrossFireArabia
September 3, 2025

At least 13 people were killed as the Israeli army continued attacks in the Gaza Strip, medics said on Wednesday.

Medical sources told Anadolu that five people, including a pregnant woman and her unborn child, were killed when an Israeli helicopter struck a residential building in western Gaza City.

Another home was hit by an army helicopter in central Gaza City, resulting in the death of three people, they added according to Anadolu.

Israeli forces also targeted tents sheltering displaced civilians in the vicinity of Ranteesi Specialist Hospital in the Nasr neighborhood of the same city. A number of injuries, including severe wounds, were reported.

Israeli warplanes hit a residential building in the Nasr neighborhood, injuring several others.

Meanwhile, the Israeli army continued to detonate homes by blowing up booby-trapped robots in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, Gaza City, under an occupation plan.

On Aug. 8, Israel’s security cabinet approved a plan by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to gradually reoccupy the Gaza Strip beginning with Gaza City.

Israeli quadcopter helicopters dropped incendiary bombs on tents sheltering displaced people and stalls in the Sheikh Radwan marketplace, sparking fires that damaged the tents and citizens’ properties. An Israeli artillery shelled the Zeitoun and Sabra neighborhoods in the same city, witnesses said.

In the central Gaza Strip, five Palestinians were killed and five others injured in drone strikes on the Nuseirat refugee camp.

The Israeli army has since launched a brutal military offensive on the Gaza Strip, killing more than 63,600 Palestinians in Gaza. The military campaign has devastated the enclave, which is facing famine.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

News

Israel Kills Journalist No 247 in Gaza

CrossFireArabia
September 1, 2025

Israeli strikes on Gaza City killed Palestinian journalist Islam Al Abed, Sunday. This brings the total number of journalists killed by Israeli fire to 247 since the war began on 27 October, 20023 according to the Gaza Media Office.

Abed, a correspondent for Al-Quds Today TV was among the dozens killed on Sunday as a result of the Israeli bombing of different areas of the Gaza City in retaliation of the targeting of Israeli soldiers in which at least one was killed and 20 injured the previous day.

In a statement, the Gaza Media Office condemned what it described as the “systematic” targeting of Palestinian journalists and urged the international community to take action to stop the killings and protect media workers according to Anadolu.

The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate also denounced the killing of Abed, calling Israel’s targeting of Palestinian journalists “a stain of shame that will haunt the killers of truth and a full-fledged war crime added to the occupation’s long record of violations against journalists.”

The syndicate held Israel “fully responsible for the killing of colleague Islam Abed and all other media professionals martyred while performing their professional duty” and called on global human rights and media organizations to take “urgent and effective action to hold Israeli leaders accountable for their ongoing crimes against Palestinian journalism.”

Israel has killed nearly 63,500 Palestinians in Gaza since October 2023. The military campaign has devastated the enclave, which is facing famine.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

Analyses

Worst Day For The Israeli Army. Why?

CrossFireArabia
August 30, 2025

By Dr Marwan Asmar

As the Israeli army attempts to enter and control Gaza City, it is receiving constant and horrendous shocks from the Palestinian resistance groups after 23 months of fighting. It is sobering for Israeli soldiers as four simultaneous ambushes were carried out against in an area of eight kilometers supposedly flattened by American-supplied mass bombs.

The latest carried Tuesday night by Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters is sending shockwaves in Israel and among its army because of the intensity of the clashes and firepower where it is reported that Israeli tanks and armed carriers were blown up in face-to-face fighting with machine guns and other explosives.

The toll is still being counted but Hamas are promising this is just the beginning.

On the Israeli side at least one soldier was killed, 11 others injured and four soldiers missing. They are feared to be taken hostages by Hamas although the Israeli army wouldn’t confirm this with latest reports that them may have reestablished contact. But this is yet to be verified.

Many media outlets, primarily Israeli, are speculating the Israeli army may have activated its Hannibal Directive and killed at least one its soldier rather than allowing him to be taken alive by resistance fighters.

The latest clashes, carried out in Al Zaytun and Sabra neighborhoods, on the southern outskirts of Gaza City is being described by the Israeli media as another 7 October when 1200 Israelis were killed and 250 hostages were taken by Hamas fighters back to Gaza City.

This description is setting additional shockwaves among Israeli society and fear that the remaining hostages in Gaza, dubbed at least 20 will not come out alive, nor the 30 killed will not be handed back.

The latest ambushes are suggesting as well Hamas and other Palestinian resistance groups are still in their top fighting form despite the repeated utterings by Israeli Prime Minister that his army is “cleaning up” the areas of Gaza from these fighters and in spite of the fact that most of the enclave has been turned into rubble with more than 63,000 killed by the Israeli war machine.

While Israel controls 75 percent of the Israeli army, they are yet to enter Gaza City. The latest incursion into the Al Zaytun neighborhood is number seven. Their previous incursions, totaling six have ended in failure. As a result of the latest ambushes, Israeli soldiers have withdrew yet again further south to the Natzarim Crossing which they now control and effectively split Gaza into two halves.

The Battle for Gaza City is still in its early stages however and Israel is in for more surprises. The Israeli Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir who is already deeply dismayed about attempting to control Gaza City because of insurmountable logistical reasons and powerful armed Palestinian groups, is sure to be greatly worried from the latest ambushes.

He has already warned the Netanyahu that Israel could lose 100 soldiers in the battle which is yet to start to control Gaza City and prefers a political solution. But this is not in the offing or an option for the political leaders who insist that the military plod on regardless of their safety and security.

By western estimations, the Palestinian resistance groups – mainly Hamas and Islamic Jihad – continue to have anything between 25,0000 to 50,0000 fighters and will likely maintain their maintain their momentum and keep emerging from underground tunnels. Experts have said this is indeed a miracle for many of these tunnels, including the one under Al Zaytun, are still intact and continue to replenish the resistance.

At the moment many of the Palestinian fighters, including from leftist factions like the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine have relocated and the Zaytun Battalion has rebuilt itself which the Israeli army claimed it destroyed in the previous 22 months. The scorching ambushes that occurred recently, and whose Israel is keeping a tight censorship lip about the actual number of its deaths and injured, are just the beginning and there is likely to be more in the coming days.

Zamir is well aware of the tough fight that lies ahead and that is why his is claiming to be following a strategy of moving slowly and “surely”. But judging from the latest fight this strategy is failing before it gets off-the-ground as the decision to enter the formidable was taken two weeks ago.