By Ibrahim al-Khazen
ISTANBUL (AA) - Egypt warned Monday of “grave humanitarian risks” from a planned Israeli ground attack in Rafah city at the southern tip of the Gaza Strip.
An Israeli operation in Rafah “will entail grave humanitarian risks that threaten more than a million Palestinians residing in that region,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
It urged Israel to exercise “maximum restraint” to avoid further escalation “at this extremely sensitive time in the course of the cease-fire negotiations.”
The ministry said Egypt is continuing its contacts with all parties "to prevent the situation from escalating or getting out of control."
The situation escalated in the Gaza Strip early Monday after the Israeli army issued immediate evacuation orders for Palestinians in the eastern neighborhoods of Rafah and called on them to move to the town of al-Mawasi in southern Gaza.
Around 100,000 Palestinian civilians are estimated to be living in the areas to be evacuated, according to Israeli Army Radio.
Rafah is home to more than 1.5 million displaced Palestinians who have taken refuge from the war launched by Israel following Hamas' Oct. 7 attack that killed nearly 1,200 people.
Since then, the Israeli onslaught has killed more than 34,700 Palestinians, mostly women and children, besides causing a humanitarian catastrophe.
Nearly seven months into the Israeli war, vast swathes of Gaza lay in ruins, pushing 85% of the enclave’s population into internal displacement amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water and medicine, according to the UN.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January said it is "plausible" that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza and ordered Tel Aviv to stop such acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians there.
*Writing by Ahmed Asmar