Israeli Defense Minister: Thousands of Terrorists Remain in Northern Gaza; War Continues in the South

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, during a visit to the Gaza Strip, stated: "The feeling that we are stopping [the campaign against Hamas] is mistaken." According to the Times of Israel, he mentioned that Israel has destroyed 12 Hamas battalions in northern Gaza. Gallant said: "Terrorists still remain; there are still a few thousand of the 15,000 or 18,000 who were in the area. Many of them have been eliminated, while others have fled to the south [of Gaza]." He noted that in northern Gaza, the Israeli army will continue smaller operations to root out the last Hamas fighters. Gallant indicated that the situation in southern Gaza is different, with the Israeli army reaching senior Hamas officials who, according to him, are hiding in the Khan Younis area. The Israeli Defense Minister asserted that the war in southern Gaza will continue with "high intensity." Gallant promised: "We will end this campaign when Hamas no longer acts as a governing entity and certainly not as a military framework... This will take time." He also mentioned: "Unfortunately, there are other threats, the first and most prominent of which are the events occurring in the north," referring to daily attacks by Hezbollah in Lebanon. Palestinians claim that Israel's retaliatory operations in Gaza have resulted in the deaths of over 22,000 people. These operations began after the terrorist attack by Hamas and its allies on October 7, during which armed Palestinian men killed about 1,200 people in Israel and took around 240 hostages. Concurrently with Israel's attacks on border areas in Syria and Lebanon, an armed drone was shot down over Erbil Airport in Iraq. A meeting between Amir-Abdollahian and the Houthi spokesperson in Tehran occurred one day after David Cameron's warning.