Israeli forces rescued early this Friday in Rafah, southern tip of the Gaza Strip, two hostages, Fernando Simón Marman, 60, and Norberto Louis Har, 70, both kidnapped in the Nir Yitzhak kibbutz on October 7. They did it during an assault in which They have killed almost a hundred Palestinians at the southern end of the Gaza Strip where there are more than a million displaced Gazans.

“They are both in good health and have been transferred to the Sheba Tel Hashomer hospital for his medical examination,” indicated a joint statement from the Army, the Police and the Intelligence services of the Shin Bet, the three forces involved in the operation. This is the second hostage rescue achieved by Israel, after to capture soldier Ori Megidish alive at the end of October.

The Islamist group Hamas accused Israel this Monday of having committed a “massacre against unarmed civilians” in Rafah, during the rescue operation this morning of two Israeli hostages. “The attack carried out tonight by the Nazi occupation army in Rafah and its horrendous massacres against unarmed civiliansincluding displaced children, women and elderlywhich has so far caused more than 100 martyrs, is a continuation of the genocide and attempts at forced displacement against our Palestinian people,” the Islamist group said in a statement.

“Deepening of the genocide”

Palestinian medical sources previously reported fifty people died during the operation, although they also pointed out that the number may increase in the coming hours as bodies are rescued from the rubble after the intense Israeli bombings. Israeli Army spokesman Daniel Hagari has indicated that the rescue operation in a building in the heart of Rafah was carried out with the support of “intense firepower” from the Air Force; and that about fifty “terrorists” were killed nearby, with no casualties in the Israeli ranks.

Hamas has denounced the “deepening of the genocide” in Rafah, given the “tragic conditions” in which 1.4 million Gazans live – more than a million of them displaced – in that city, whose “streets have become camps for refugees who live in extremely difficult and harsh conditions without their most basic needs covered.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a plan over the weekend to expand the ground military offensive in Rafah -where he alleges that there are still four Hamas battalions-, although he promised to evacuate civilians first, something difficult in a completely devastated enclave with its armored borders.

“The terrorist government of Netanyahu and their Nazi Army ignores blatantly ignores the decisions of the International Court of Justice issued two weeks ago, which prescribed urgent measures, including the halting of any steps that could be considered acts of genocide,” Hamas said. The Islamist group has called on the Biden US administration; UN Security Council, the Arab League, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation to take “immediate and serious measures to stop Zionist aggression.”