Israel to set up 10,000 tents near Rafah before ground invasion of southern Gaza city: Report

By Zein Khalil

JERUSALEM (AA) - Israel plans to set up 10,000 tents near Rafah in two weeks before a land invasion in Gaza, the Israeli public broadcaster KAN has claimed.

According to the report on Monday, 30,000 additional tents are also planned to be installed in the same area, which lies to the south of the Gaza Strip, at a later time.

KAN also said in the report that the process of evacuating Palestinians from Rafah would take a long time.

The report added that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said last week that "the date was determined" for the land attack on Rafah, "postponed" this step.

- Rafah is where Palestinians took refuge

The city of Rafah, located south of Gaza on the Egyptian border, was home to around 280,000 Palestinians before the Israeli attacks. Due to Israel's attacks on Oct. 7, some 1.9 million people were displaced in the Gaza Strip, which has a population of 2.3 million.

Most of the displaced Palestinians took refuge in Rafah, which Israel had previously claimed was "safe." With the arrivals from the northern regions, the population of Rafah more than quadrupled, reaching 1.5 million.

Most of the Palestinians who took refuge in Rafah due to lack of sufficient housing are struggling to survive in camps consisting of makeshift tents.

The Israeli army targets the city of Rafah with frequent air strikes. It is feared that if Israel launches a land attack on the city of Rafah, civilians will have no shelter in the Gaza Strip.

On Feb. 9, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed the Israeli army and security services to "prepare a plan to attack Rafah."