Palestinian leader urges global community, rights groups to stop Israel's planned 'massacres' in Rafah

By Qais Abu Samra

RAMALLAH, Palestine (AA) - A day after Israel's defense minister announced that his army's next target would be the southern city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip, head of the Palestinian National Initiative party warned on Tuesday of "brutal massacres" against displaced Palestinians, urging the international community and rights organizations to stop Tel Aviv from carrying out the plan.

"Any military operations in Rafah, with its limited space and crowdedness with over 1.5 million Palestinians displaced by the Israeli army, would lead to brutal massacres unprecedented in modern history," Mustafa Barghouti said in a statement.

The majority of Palestinians living in Rafah are displaced from other parts of Gaza.

Barghouti’s statement came a day after Israel's Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced Rafah as the army's next target in a press conference, claiming it is the last remaining stronghold of the Palestinian group Hamas.

The leader of the Palestinian National Initiative party blamed the US and its Western allies for allowing Israel to "unleash fascism, which has so far led to the killing and injuring of 100,000 Palestinians."

He urged the international community and the international rights campaign to prevent Israel from carrying out the massacre in Rafah.

Several human rights organizations have already warned that any Israeli military offensive in Rafah could kill a large number of people.

Israel has launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 attack by Hamas in which Tel Aviv says nearly 1,200 Israelis were killed.

At least 27,478 Palestinians have been killed and 66,835 others injured in Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, the Health Ministry in the enclave said on Monday.

The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60% of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

*Writing by Ahmed Asmar in Ankara