Israel escalates Gaza bombardment in first week of 2025

CGTN Europe

Palestinian officials say at least 59 people have been killed in Gaza since dawn on Saturday.   Israel has been escalating its bombardment of the Gaza strip for the past two days.   CGTN’s Jonathan Regev is in Tel Aviv.   #Israel #Gaza

Transcript

00:00First, one major operation against what is known in Israel, possibly in Gaza as well,

00:06as the officers' neighborhood. It's quite a high-rise buildings, which are located

00:13in Beit Hanun, right in front of the Israeli city of Sderot. And these are buildings which

00:18are very uncharacteristic to the other structures in the area, high-rise buildings, which,

00:24at least on the ground officially, were meant for residential purposes of Hamas officers.

00:30But according to the Israeli army, this was not a residential area, but rather a military

00:36compound with bunkers, with tunnels, with a lot of ammunition. And the buildings were high,

00:45very uncharacteristic to Gaza, especially to this area of Gaza, where most of the structures are

00:50much lower. Therefore, what Israel claims is that this area was used as a military compound,

00:55which is high, overlooking the entire area. And now, according to the Israeli army,

01:00this neighborhood, this officer's neighborhood, was dismantled completely.

01:05And also, we're hearing that the United States is planning this $8 billion arms sale to Israel.

01:12Do you have any more information on that? $8 billion U.S. dollars. This is the deal.

01:19There's no confirmation from the Israeli side. It's the Jewish Sabbath now. So, usually, unless

01:24it's something of an emergency, then there's no direct comment from Israel. We might hear a comment

01:30later in the day when the Jewish Sabbath is over. But we have heard from sources in the United

01:36States that this is about to happen, one of the last actions of Joe Biden as U.S. president,

01:42a very big arms sale to Israel. And I think this puts aside a lot of the comments made

01:50indirectly, not directly, but indirectly, by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the people

01:55that surround him many times over the past week, over the past year, mainly over the past few

02:00months. They have spoken of a quiet arms embargo from the United States, meaning that Israel has

02:07asked for certain elements from the U.S. which were not authorized by the U.S. to export to

02:13Israel. This perhaps puts it all aside, $8 billion. That is a lot of ammunition. Some of it

02:19will be provided quite soon. Other elements, of course, will first have to be manufactured

02:26and then provided through the years. But, of course, such a big package shows that the Biden

02:33administration in one of its last moves is very committed to the security of Israel. These are

02:39moves that President Biden perhaps was a bit cautious to make before the elections due to

02:45criticism on his policy coming from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.

02:51Now, when there are no electoral thoughts to make, then these things are happening. I think

02:58President Joe Biden, once again, is making it quite clear that at least, maybe not the

03:03whole Democratic Party, but at least him, the President, is very committed to the security

03:09of Israel. And that is why he's approving this very big arms deal, which is about to go ahead

03:15in the coming days.

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