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PFLP vows to turn Rafah into Israeli occupiers 'graveyard' if invaded

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Al Mayadeen
6 Feb 2024 18:40
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The Resistance group says the recent intensified Israeli attacks on Rafah are a prelude to military offensive against the densely populated city.

A Palestinian woman makes bread outside a tent at a makeshift camp housing Palestinians forcibly displaced by the Israeli occupation, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on January 2, 2024 (AFP)

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) has held the US administration and the international community responsible for the serious consequences of any ground Israeli invasion of the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.

The Resistance group's statement came amid reports of a potential close Israeli military attack on the city as part of plans to completely cut off Gaza by occupying the Philadelphi Axis; a 14 km narrow strip of land that separates Palestine from Egypt.

Meanwhile, the United Nations and human rights organizations have also warned that Rafah is experiencing an unprecedented humanitarian, health, and living crisis in modern history.

Over half of Gaza's population

In a statement released on Tuesday, the PFLP stated that "the US administration and the international system, by participating in the Zionist genocide war and aligning with the occupation's crime of forcing hundreds of thousands of our people to flee to Rafah, are contributing to committing an unprecedented war crime by creating the world's largest densely populated 'ghetto'."

Commenting on the anticipated Israeli extensive ground offensive against Rafah, the PFLP warned that the occupation has paved the way for this invasion by intensifying its fierce bombardment of the city and the homes of innocent citizens.

Rafah has become a refuge for the majority of Palestinians fleeing the relentless Israeli onslaughts and massacres throughout the Strip. Over half of Gaza's 2.3 million population are now residing there, almost 80% of which are forcibly displaced from other regions, with makeshift tent zones dominating the city.

The Front pointed out that Palestinians trapped in Rafah, within a limited geographic area, are suffering from the extreme hardships of displacement, catastrophic conditions, the spread of diseases, and severe shortages of medicine, relief supplies, and safe drinking water.

The Resistance is ready to protect its people

During the first months of the war on Gaza, the occupation entity designated Khan Younis and Rafah as "safe areas", ordering Palestinians living in northern Gaza to move toward the cities, along other areas south of the Strip.

However, as the aggression continued, Khan Younis later became the center of Israeli attacks and has remained so for almost two months now, and Rafah continued to be regularly bombed, leading to dozens of massacres, including several attacks on the city's crossing to prevent aid trucks from moving into Gaza from Egypt.

In that regard, the PFLP emphasized that the Israeli occupation is seeking to escape its successive defeats in the areas it invaded by land and the significant losses it has incurred in terms of soldiers and equipment.

"[Israelis] have failed to achieve any military objectives or accomplishments on the ground, despite propagating the false claim of 'completing the cleansing of resistance pockets and achieving field achievements in Khan Yunis, the central region, Gaza, and the north,'" the group said.

Reaffirming the Resistance's constant state of readiness to defend its people, the Front declared that "the resistance in all its military branches in Rafah is ready to confront any Israeli ground invasion of the city" and affirmed that "as always, it would turn the alleys, camps, and streets of the city into a graveyard for Zionist invaders and a burning ground for their vehicles and tanks, just as the resistance did in all areas of the Gaza Strip."