As Israeli strikes kill hundreds in Gaza, retired general says assault will mean “more hostages dead,” too

Tel Aviv — For a second night in a row, Israel‘s military launched airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, killing at least 13 more people by early Wednesday after more than 400 were killed the previous day, according to health officials in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory.

Israel’s military said it had targeted a Hamas military site in the enclave’s southern al-Mawasi humanitarian zone, near the border with Egypt. At least two civilians were among those killed Wednesday, according to the Red Crescent.

Separately, the United Nations agency UNOPS, which helps implement humanitarian, development and peacebuilding projects around the world, said Wednesday that one of its staffers had apparently been killed in a blast in the central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah.

“Reports are coming in that a UNOPS colleague has been killed in a detonation in Deir al Balah. It is understood that UNOPS accommodation was hit at approximately 11:30 a.m. this morning,” the agency said.

The statement from UNOPS came a couple hours after Israel’s military issued a statement denying reports that it had struck “a U.N. compound” in Deir al-Balah, and adding a call for “media outlets to act with caution regarding unverified reports.”

The mounting deaths come after Israel definitively ended a two-month ceasefire with Hamas before dawn Tuesday, resuming full-scale military operations in Gaza and threatening to ramp up its assault further. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a national address Tuesday night, vowed more strikes to force Hamas to release all of the remaining 59 hostages held in Gaza, about two dozen of whom are still believed to be alive.

On Wednesday, Israel said it launched a “limited ground operation” in northern Gaza to retake part of a corridor that bisects it, The Associated Press reported.

Even before Israel resumed military operations it had halted all humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza, drawing warnings from aid agencies and the United Nations that civilians would suffer unduly for the impasse in talks aimed at extending the ceasefire.

“It would be a blessing if this kid passed”

Dr. Marc Perlmutter, an American surgeon who has been volunteering at the al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah, northern Gaza, told CBS News on Tuesday that the facility was struggling to cope with the influx of new patients wounded by Israel’s attacks, and that young Palestinians were among those with the worst injuries.

“The level of bodily damage that these children get in particular is insane. My surgeries there consisted of 4- and 5- and 6-year-old kids with significant nerve injuries, and I’ve had to borrow nerves from both of their legs to graft nerves in their arms,” he told CBS News in a phone interview. “Israel has no trouble bombing hospital grounds. Fifty feet from me is a mosque that was thoroughly destroyed. There’s no inhibition on their part to focus on population centers.”

Perlmutter said given the complete lack of medical supplies – he doesn’t even have soap to wash his hands – made it impossible to properly treat some of the children coming in with grave injuries.

Speaking of one boy, he said “it would be a blessing if this kid passed, because of the amount of pain and the amount of destruction in his body – and our ability to deal with it in this setting is impossibly limited – and there’s no place to transfer him to. There’s no level-one trauma center. They’re all overwhelmed.”

Israeli protesters condemn Netanyahu’s return to war

Black plumes rose along Israel’s border fence with Gaza on Tuesday as the tired but unrelenting mother of Israeli hostage Matan Zangauker, holding a smoke canister up to the sky, angrily protested Netanyahu’s resumption of military operations.

“Don’t let the prime minister and the members of his government sacrifice the lives of my son Matan and of all the other living hostages just to remain in power,” shouted Zangauker, a prominent leader of the protests that happen every week. “We will not give up on you, we will not allow a return to fighting.”

Hamas terrorists kidnapped her 25-year-old son from Kibbutz Nir Oz during the unprecedented massacre on Oct. 7, 2023.

Demonstrations, led by hostages’ families, have exploded across Israel since the strikes in Gaza resumed, with thousands rallying regularly outside Israel’s legislature, the Knesset, in Jerusalem and Israel’s military headquarters, the Kirya, in Tel Aviv.

“I don’t think they’re listening. I don’t think that they’re listening to the people… to the people who elected them,” hostage supporter Carmeet Roth told CBS News at a new tent encampment outside the defense complex. She said she was “horrified” when Israel’s military relaunched airstrikes on Gaza after nearly two months of a fragile ceasefire. Her hopes for more hostages coming out alive have fallen.

“I think it is much less likely,” she said, shaking her head. “We’ve seen it before. I mean, it never brought them back. Only agreements and deals brought them back. That’s the way to move forward.”

National polls consistently show a majority of Israelis – 70% in a February survey — want the ceasefire plan agreed to by Israel and Hamas, which was negotiated by the U.S., Egypt and Qatar, to continue as originally laid out. A second phase of that plan, which should have begun on March 1, stipulated the release of more living hostages in exchange for the full withdrawal of Israel’s military from Gaza.

Israel, with support from the Trump administration, demanded a change to those terms as Phase-1 of the agreement ended, however, accusing Hamas of breaching the deal and calling for an extension of the first phase under a new plan it attributed to the White House.

Will Gaza assault destroy Hamas, or just leave “more hostages dead”?

Retired General Israel Ziv knows a lot about how Israeli forces operate in the Gaza Strip. He commanded the military’s Gaza division during the last major clash in the early 2000s, which, while it paled in comparison to the current war, saw heavy casualties on both sides.

But the 30-year veteran warned that Israel’s military may have reached its limit in forcing Hamas to bend to the will of Netanyahu and his far-right government, which has vowed repeatedly to achieve its stated goal of destroying Hamas.

“You can go up to, let’s say, 80%, 90% of destroying the Hamas,” he said. “But this last 10%, which is the hardest and the most problematic one, you cannot achieve militarily.”

Ziv said only a political solution could bring a lasting peace between Israel and Hamas, and he accused Netanyahu of operating “without enough courage to bring some political solutions to the table.”

Ziv said Netanyahu was stuck with a Catch-22: Vowing to free the remaining hostages safely while at the same time trying to kill the people who are holding them.

Israel Defense Forces International spokesman Nadav Shoshani insists the military is ready to increase pressure on Hamas, and that doing so would bring the remaining hostages home.

“We’re ready with a different set of plans, including more troops on the ground and a ground operation if needed,” he told CBS News at a briefing this week. “History shows that the military pressure could bring back hostages.”

Ziv disagrees with that assessment.

“We know over a year now that military pressure does not bring back the hostages,” he said. “And in some cases, the other way – it kills them. It kills hostages.”

“To my opinion, unfortunately, if we keep on just with those raids and attacks, I think we’re going to see more hostages dead.”