Israel Works to Expel Hamas Intruders and Secure Border
TEL AVIV—Israeli troops engaged in fierce fighting into the early hours of Monday morning to regain control of swaths of the country’s south after Hamas militants flooded in from Gaza, with the military struggling to reseal the border to further incursions.
The last infiltrators from Gaza were being hunted down with the task expected to take at least a few more hours, military spokesman Jonathan Conricus said in a livestream on X, formerly known as Twitter, around 2 a.m. local time Monday.
Throughout Sunday, the Israeli government was still working to evacuate civilians from towns and villages near Gaza, densely populated Palestinian enclaves, and authorities worked to treat hundreds of wounded civilians, recover the bodies of the dead and try to determine how many Israelis were being held hostage.
The Israeli cabinet approved a declaration of war after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Saturday a call-up for hundreds of thousands of military reservists, saying in a televised address: “We are at war and we will win it.”
Iran-backed Hamas said it had been able to send additional men and weapons into Israel on Sunday and it launched a fresh barrage of missiles from Gaza.
Meanwhile, another Iran-backed militant group, Hezbollah, fired mortar shells and a missile at Israeli targets from southern Lebanon. The Hezbollah attacks raised the specter of a second front opening in the conflict as Israel prepared for broader strikes on militant targets in Gaza. Hamas sought to sow more turmoil, calling for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank to riot and confront Israeli soldiers there.
Late Sunday, Gaza militants fired another barrage of rockets, while Israel carried out airstrikes in the Palestinian territory. The Israeli military also said that one of its marine commando units had captured a Hamas deputy commander of the militant group’s naval force.
More than 700 Israelis have been confirmed dead, and 2,408 wounded, according to Israel’s Army Radio. At least 413 Palestinians have been killed and around 2,300 injured in Israeli counterstrikes on Gaza, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
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