Israel and Hamas enter 10 months of war with maximum tension in the Middle East

The war between Israel and the Islamist group Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, is in its 10th month on Wednesday amid a peak of tension in the Middle East, amid expectations of a possible attack by Iran and its allied militias against Israel.

The Jewish state has been in a state of anxiety for a week since Iran and its allied militias swore to avenge the murders of the top military leader of the Shiite group Hezbollah, Fuad Shukr, killed in an Israeli bombing outside Beirut on July 30, and the political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed in an attack in Tehran on July 31, which Iranian authorities attribute to Israel.

“Our enemies, poisoned by hatred, blinded by radicalism and anti-Semitism, have sworn to attack us again.“Israeli President Isaac Herzog complained in a message to Jewish communities around the world.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried to calm the growing anxiety of the population by assuring that Israel “is prepared for both defense and attack”.

“I know that the citizens of Israel are on alert, and I ask you one thing: remain patient and calm. We are prepared.”, he insisted, while some Israeli media suggest that Israel is studying the possibility of a “preemptive strike“to deter Iran, even though the international community, especially the United States, is trying to prevent a regional escalation through diplomatic means.

Although the Israeli army has not given any special instructions to citizens, authorities in the north of the country have recommended staying close to shelters, avoiding crowds and unnecessary journeys, given the possibility of an even greater escalation on the border with Lebanon.

The area is experiencing its worst peak of tension since the 2006 war, after Hezbollah opened fire on Israel on October 8 in solidarity with Hamas, triggering a war that has left nearly 600 dead, most of them on the Lebanese side and in the ranks of the militia.

A war that never ends

Since Hamas launched the war on October 7 last year with an attack on Israel that left some 1,200 dead and 251 kidnapped, at least 39,677 Palestinians have been killed – mostly children and women -, 91,645 wounded and some 10,000 missing under the rubble in the devastated Gaza Strip, which has been relentlessly battered by the Israeli army’s air, land and sea offensives.

111 Israeli hostages remain in captivity in the Gaza Strip, including two children, five and one years old respectively. According to Israel, 39 of these hostages have been killed, a figure that rises to more than 70 according to Hamas.

For their part, Israeli forces have arrested thousands of Gazans, considering them “suspects”, many of them imprisoned without formal charges in prisons where torture and abuse are systematically practiced, according to several international organizations.

Last week, 10 Israeli soldiers were arrested for allegedly sexually abusing a Palestinian prisoner at the Sde Teiman detention center.

Half of them were released, but another uniformed officer faces charges for allegedly having exercised “severe violence against (Palestinian) detainees in their custody.”

The war has also left nearly two million displaced, of whom 1.9 million are Gazans – almost the entire population – who are surviving in the midst of an unprecedented humanitarian crisis due to the widespread destruction of homes, the collapse of hospitals, the outbreak of epidemics, the threat of famine and the shortage of drinking water, medicine and electricity.

Meanwhile, some 100,000 Israelis are displaced by the war, some of them residents of communities near Gaza and others from the border area with Lebanon, where air raid sirens are activated daily due to militant attacks and Israeli interceptors.

The United States, Israel’s largest arms partner and supplier, Qatar and Egypt have been mediating for months to reach a ceasefire agreement that would allow the release of hostages in Gaza and the entry of aid into the Palestinian enclave.

However, this possibility seems to fade even further in the face of the high-tension atmosphere in the region and after Haniyeh, considered moderate, was replaced by the radical and belligerent Yahya Sinwar, who leads the armed wing of Hamas inside Gaza.

Iran launched an unprecedented direct attack on Israeli territory in mid-April, using 350 drones and missiles, in retaliation for a bombing of the Iranian consulate in Damascus that killed seven members of the Revolutionary Guard, including two generals.

That attack was neutralized by the defense systems of Israel and its Western allies and left minor damage.