Israeli forces clashed with fighters from the Palestinian group Hamas on Sunday, 24 hours after a surprise attack was launched on Israel in which nearly 500 people were killed in the deadliest day of violence in Israel for 50 years.
The biggest incursion into Israel in decades could undermine US-backed efforts to forge regional security alignments that could threaten Palestinian aspirations for statehood.
Hamas fighters began their attack at dawn on Saturday with a huge barrage of rockets into southern Israel, giving cover to an unprecedented, multi-pronged infiltration of fighters into Israel from Gaza, a narrow strip that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians.
Hamas fighters killed at least 250 Israelis in clashes throughout the day and escaped back into Gaza with dozens of hostages. More than 230 Gazans were killed when Israel responded with one of its most devastating days of retaliatory strikes.
“We will take mighty vengeance for this wicked day,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday.
Israeli troops battled Hamas fighters through the night in parts of southern Israel. An Israeli army spokesperson said on social media the situation was not fully under control.
The escalation comes against a backdrop of surging violence between Israel forces and Palestinian fighters in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority exercises limited self-rule, opposed by Hamas that wants Israel destroyed.
The West Bank has seen stepped-up Israeli raids, Palestinian street attacks, and assaults by Jewish settlers on Palestinian villages. Conditions for Palestinians have worsened under Netanyahu’s hard-right government. Peacemaking has been stalled for years.
‘We warned you’
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said the assault that began in Gaza would spread to the West Bank and Jerusalem. Gazans have lived under an Israeli blockade for 16 years.
In a speech, Haniyeh highlighted threats to Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque, the continuation of an Israeli blockade on Gaza, and Israeli normalisation with countries in the region.
“How many times have we warned you that the Palestinian people have been living in refugee camps for 75 years, and you refuse to recognise the rights of our people?”
Bodies of Israeli civilians surrounded by broken glass were strewn across the streets of Sderot in southern Israel near Gaza. The bodies of a man and a woman were sprawled across the front seats of a car.
Terrified Israelis, barricaded into safe rooms, recounted their plight by phone on live television.
Senior military officers were among those killed in fighting near Gaza, the Israeli military said.
Netanyahu’s office said his security cabinet had approved steps to destroy the military and governmental capabilities of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, another militant group, “for many years”, including cutting electricity, fuel supplies, and the entry of goods into Gaza.
In Gaza, black smoke, orange flashes, and sparks lit the sky from explosions. Israeli drones could be heard overhead.
Gaza’s dead and wounded were carried into crumbling and overcrowded hospitals with severe shortages of medical supplies and equipment. The health ministry said 232 people had been killed and at least 1,700 wounded.
Biden offers support
Meanwhile, US President Joe Biden offered Israel on Saturday “all appropriate means of support” and warned “any party hostile to Israel” not to seek advantage.
US and Israeli officials were coordinating Israel’s military needs in the wake of the attack, with a decision expected soon, a senior US official said.
The United States is working with other governments to make sure the crisis does not spread and is contained to Gaza, the official said.
“We want to make sure this is contained in Gaza,” the official told reporters.
The escalation erupted amid efforts by Biden and his team to negotiate a landmark normalisation agreement between foes Israel and Saudi Arabia and a US-Saudi defense pact.
Biden spoke by phone to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday to offer US support, with scenes of violence playing out on American news networks. The two leaders have had strained relations but met in New York last month in a show of solidarity.
“I made clear to Prime Minister Netanyahu that we stand ready to offer all appropriate means of support to the government and people of Israel,” Biden said in a written statement issued after their call.
In his televised remarks later, Biden issued a blunt warning.
“Israel has a right to defend itself and its people — full stop,” he said. “Let me say this as clearly as I can. This is not a moment for any party hostile to Israel to exploit these attacks to seek advantage. The world is watching.”
The senior US official, speaking on a conference call, said there was no indication yet that Iran was involved in the Hamas attack but vowed to look into it.
Amid worries about a massive Israeli intelligence failure, the official said Washington had no specific warning or indication that Hamas would launch the attack.
“We always share timely intelligence,” the official said.
Biden directed his national security team to stay in touch about the situation with countries throughout the region including Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, and European allies.
The United States has been seeking a deal to normalise ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia, seen by Israelis as the biggest prize yet in their decades-long quest for Arab recognition. Palestinians fear any such agreement could sell out their dreams of an independent state.
Osama Hamdan, the leader of Hamas in Lebanon, told Reuters that Saturday’s operation should make Arab states realise that accepting Israeli security demands would not bring peace.
Across the Middle East, there were demonstrations in support of Hamas, with Israeli and US flags set on fire and marchers waving Palestinian flags in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen. Iran and Hezbollah, Iran’s Lebanese allies, praised the Hamas attack.
Hamas deputy chief Saleh al-Arouri told Al Jazeera that the group was holding a large number of Israeli captives, including senior officials. He said Hamas had enough captives to make Israel free all Palestinians in its jails.
Hamas said the attack was driven by what it called escalated Israeli attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank, Jerusalem, and against Palestinians in Israeli prisons.
That Israel was caught completely off guard was lamented as one of the worst intelligence failures in its history, a shock to a nation that boasts of its intensive infiltration and monitoring of militants.
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