'We are in a war,' Netanyahu says after Palestinian militants launch surprise attack
Hamas claimed responsibility for the unprecedented assault, which the militants said involved 5,000 rockets and infiltration across the border.
Israel was plunged into chaos Saturday after Palestinian militants launched a deadly land, air and sea attack inside the country, with Hamas fighters infiltrating the southern border and firing a massive barrage of rockets from the Gaza Strip.
"We are in a war," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared in a video on social media. He ordered strikes on Gaza and called for an "extensive reserve mobilization" as the nation responds to the unprecedented incursion.
At least 70 people in Israel have been killed, a spokesperson for the Israeli rescue service Magen David Adom said in a statement.
Graphic but unverified video and photos shared on social media suggested that toll could rise sharply, while Hamas fighters were able to take a number of soldiers and civilians hostage, the Israeli military said.
What? I thought Jared and Donald had brokered an ever lasting peace in Middle East. Didn’t The Orange demand a Nobel Peace prize for that?
"Hamas terrorists", god, our country has become so hypocritical.
What would you call them, then?
"one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter"
Freedom fighters don’t go door to door killing or kidnapping civilians.
So what do we call Israel then?
The same thing we called the last apartheid state the west took an interest in?
This is incorrect. The Americans seized Loyalists and executed them, the Red Army killed civilians and genocided several ethnic groups, the Chinese did it, the Cubans did it, everybody does it. The distinction between "terrorist" and "freedom fighter" is who controls the narrative after the dust has settled. Warfare is atrocity.
I guarantee this has happened for every nation that has fought for its liberty.
War is never pretty.
I think that this part cannot be forgotten:
"The assault follows a period of heavy fighting in the West Bank, where nearly 200 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli military raids this year, according to U.N. Mideast Envoy Tor Wennesland. Israel says the raids are aimed at militants, but stone-throwing protesters and people uninvolved in the violence have also been killed."
You cannot blame someone for fighting back.
People who casually blow themselves up /s
Subjects of genocide and oppression fighting back
Freedom fighters.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Graphic but unverified video and photos shared on social media suggested that toll could rise sharply, while Hamas fighters were able to take a number of soldiers and civilians hostage, the Israeli military said.
European heads of state — including German Chancellor OIaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron — excoriated Hamas and expressed solidarity with Israel.
Across Israel’s Route 3, a highway 15 miles north of Gaza, police armed with assault rifles fanned out across roads, checking cars for gunmen trying to pass farther into the country.
The violence follows weeks of heightened tensions along Israel’s volatile border with Gaza, and heavy fighting in the Israeli-occupied West Bank — but also years of unresolved grievances over the treatment of Palestinians that have long threatened to erupt.
Saturday's stunning developments come at a crucial moment, as Israel pursues what would be a landmark deal to normalize relations with Saudi Arabia that is being brokered by the United States.
The assault follows a period of heavy fighting in the West Bank, where nearly 200 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli military raids this year, according to U.N. Mideast Envoy Tor Wennesland.
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