Israel expects 6-8-week drive to hit Hamas in Rafah

Israel expects to continue full-scale military operations in Gaza for another six to eight weeks as it prepares to mount a ground invasion of the enclave's southernmost city of Rafah, four officials familiar with the strategy said.

Military chiefs believe they can significantly damage Hamas' remaining capabilities in that time, paving the way for a shift to a lower-intensity phase of targeted airstrikes and special forces operations, according to the two Israeli and two regional officials who asked to remain anonymous to speak freely.

There is little chance that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government will heed international criticism to call off a Rafah ground assault, said Avi Melamed, a former Israeli intelligence official and a negotiator in the first and second Palestinian intifadas, or uprisings in the 1980s and 2000s.

"Rafah is the last bastion of Hamas control, and there remain battalions in Rafah which Israel must dismantle to achieve its goals in this war," he added.

The IDF hasn't explained how it will move more than a million people within the ruins of the enclave.

According to one Israeli security source and an international aid official, who asked not to be identified, Gazans could be screened to weed out any Hamas fighters before being sent northwards. 

A separate Israeli source said Israel could also build a floating jetty north of Rafah to enable international aid and hospital ships to arrive by sea.

Nonetheless, an Israeli defense official said Palestinians wouldn't be allowed to return to north Gaza en masse, leaving scrubland around Rafah as an option for makeshift tent cities. 

The regional officials also said it wouldn't be safe to move many people into a northern zone with no power and running water, which hasn't been cleared of unexploded ordinance.

Washington is skeptical Israel has made sufficient preparations for a secure civilian evacuation, several officials familiar with the conversations between the two governments said. Biden said on Friday he didn't expect a "massive" Israeli ground invasion to happen soon.

Furthermore, according to Hamas, the total victory promised by Netanyahu won't be quick or easy.

A Hamas official based in Qatar told Reuters that the group estimated it had lost 6,000 fighters during the four-month-old conflict, half the 12,000 Israel says it has killed.

Gaza's ruling group can keep fighting and is prepared for a long war in Rafah and Gaza, said the official, who requested anonymity.

"Netanyahu's options are difficult, and ours are too. He can occupy Gaza, but Hamas is still standing and fighting. He hasn't achieved his goals to kill the Hamas leadership or annihilate Hamas," he added.

Reuters