According to the White House: Israeli-American talks in Washington on the Rafah operation will likely take place early next week. The Israeli website Walla confirmed the negotiations. “The Biden administration is studying alternative plans for the military operation in Rafah, which will be proposed to an Israeli delegation next week. One of the plans is to postpone the military operation and focus on stabilizing the humanitarian situation in northern Gaza. The Israeli assault on Rafah will represent a turning point in American-Israeli relations.”
Washington has decided to continue the US freeze on UNRWA funding until March next year. Details of alternative efforts to provide aid to the Gaza Strip will be discussed after the publication of legislation requiring the suspension of funding to the agency. Reuters reported.
Speaking at Harvard University, the architect of US Middle East policy under Trump, Jared Kushner, said that “the coastal strip of Gaza could be very valuable” and that Israel should raze part of the Negev desert and resettle there the Palestinians. Asked whether Palestinians will be allowed to return to Gaza, Kushner casually responds that there is not much space left in Gaza to return to.
More than 100 major donors and activists are warning in a letter to US President Joe Biden that progressive anger over Israel’s war on Gaza increases Donald Trump’s chances of winning the presidency, US media reports say.
António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres Secretary of the United Nations declared that: “Nothing justifies the collective punishment practiced by “Israel” against the Palestinians of Gaza.”
Canada has stopped arms exports to Israel since March 20, according to the country’s Foreign Ministry.
Israeli sources report that Israeli special forces entered Syrian territory in the Quneitra area and kidnapped a Syrian intelligence officer. Israel is attacking throughout Syria and countering, as its intelligence sources report, the clear and immediate danger of a time bomb. In recent days, according to Syrian sources, the Israeli air force has attacked Hezbollah’s headquarters and weapons and ammunition depots along the border between Syria and Lebanon twice in 48 hours, destroying “extraordinarily dangerous” weapons.
Former head of the hostile operations department of the Israeli Mossad, Oded Elam regarding Hezbollah said: “As for the North, there is a very difficult strategic problem for “Israel”… We know how to go to war with Hezbollah, but we don’t know how to get out of it.”
On March 20, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, with a drone, targeted the Ben Gurion airport in Israel, and a silent statement threatened other attacks, defining them: “completion of the second phase of operations to resist the occupation and to support our people in Gaza.”
From Israel, according to Walla’s Israeli website: “Senior officials believe that the Israeli chief of staff will announce the end of his mandate this year, and by then he will summarize the war investigations and make policy-level recommendations to rebuild the Israeli army, which will lead to the mass retirement of those responsible for the failure of October 7th.”
On Wednesday 20 March, in Hussein, Imam Khomeini was enthusiastically welcomed by the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told the crowd: “The issue of Gaza showed the extent of injustice, as more than 30,000 martyrs died here in a short period. The civilized world not only did nothing about Gaza, but also sent weapons to “Israel”.
“Some have said what is the advantage of forming an axis of resistance, and today Gaza has demonstrated the importance of this axis and it must be strengthened more and more. The resistance of Hamas and resistance groups in Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon has revealed its capabilities and embarrassed America.”
Long statement by Hamas leader Osama Hamdan which appeared in the social sphere on March 20th of which we report an excerpt: “The movement seeks to put an end to the aggressive war against our people and is intensifying its efforts to bring aid. The movement presented its vision regarding prisoner exchange and showed positivity and high flexibility. We are following the course of negotiations through brother mediators in Egypt and Qatar and have presented a comprehensive vision that realizes the aspirations of our people. Aggression must stop targeting those who seek to provide aid to our people or attempt to invade Rafah. The occupation’s response to Hamas’s proposal was negative and did not respond to the demands of our people. The occupation intensifies its crimes against our people with each round of negotiations.”
The IDF admitted that for the first time a Houthi missile flew into the Eilat area without being intercepted by air defenses. The news was reported later by the Houthis on Israel’s channel 13, citing military sources. Online video of the French Ministry of Defense which published a video of its frigate’s battle with the Houthis in the Red Sea. Some sources said that the Houthis hit another ship but at the moment there is no confirmation.
And now a look at the Israel-Hamas aggravation updated at 5.00pm on March 20th.
After a relatively quiet night on the border with southern Lebanon, in the afternoon the shooting returned, Israeli planes targeted a house near the square in the city of Qantara, south of Lebanon. For the first time since October 7, the Israeli army carried out an aggression in Lebanon, targeting the village of Qantara.
The Islamic resistance responded by hitting settlers in el-Marj with artillery shells while an Israeli logistics team was rebuilding and fortifying it after the resistance had previously destroyed it. Attack also in the Lebanese Golan by Israel: the village of Ghajar hit; shooting with machine guns and “bombs” against cattle herders east of the city of Wazzani, a place already known for the water war between Israel and Lebanon.
Israel’s Channel 14 reported that “new homes are added to the list of major losses due to Hezbollah’s activities against northern settlements.” Three explosions recorded in the Haifa and Kiryat Shmona area.
In northern Gaza. 3 dead and several injured in an Israeli raid that targeted a group of citizens at the Hamouda intersection, in the north of the Gaza Strip. Israeli raids targeted several areas of Gaza city and the north, in conjunction with artillery shelling and intense gunfire. Palestinian sources speak of 20 deaths following the bombing of the “Ayyash Home” residential tower in the Ard Al-Shanti area, north-west of Gaza.
In central Gaza. An Israeli UAV attacked the car of the Hamas police chief in Nizirat. According to local reports, five passengers in the car were killed. A large number of dead and wounded were recovered when Israeli forces shelled a house in Nuseirat camp in the center of the Gaza Strip. Israeli raid on the house of the “Al-Maqousi” family, in front of the Abu Madin police, in the center of the Gaza Strip.
Clashes recorded in southern Gaza. Al Qassam claims attack against an Israeli troop transport ship targeted in the Al-Qarara area, north of the city of Khan Yunis. Another ambush against the Israeli army near the al-Shifa hospital in the city of Gaza. According to the IDF, around 300 suspects were arrested and dozens of Hamas elements were eliminated: activities of the 162nd division which led the special operation at Shifa hospital
The 401st Brigade Combat Team, in cooperation with forces from Shayetet 13, the Duvdevan Unit under the command of the 162nd Division and the Israel Security Agency (ISA), continue operations on Shifa Hospital.
Israeli law enforcement officers have arrested dozens of key figures from Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorist organizations involved in directing terror in the West Bank at the Shifa hospital.
West Bank. The maximum tension is recorded in the West Bank where there are now areas of urban guerrilla warfare. Israeli forces continue their arrest campaign in the West Bank with 30 arrests on March 19th alone and the same number on March 20th. Jewish settlers attack a Palestinian and burn his car in the West Bank and dozens of settlers attack citizens’ homes in the city of Madama, south of Nablus.
Antonio Albanese e Graziella Giangiulio
