Thousands of Israeli reservists report for duty as military chief clashes with ministers

By Emily Rose, Maayan Lubell and Nidal al-Mughrabi

JERUSALEM/CAIRO/GAZA (Reuters) -Tens of thousands of reservists began to report for duty on Tuesday for a new Israeli offensive to seize Gaza City, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to accelerate despite warnings from senior ranks.

Palestinian health authorities said further Israeli airstrikes and shelling across the Gaza Strip had killed at least 100 people on Tuesday, 35 of them in Gaza City in the enclave's north as Israeli forces girded for the offensive.

Israeli Army Radio said 40,000 reservists would report for duty on Tuesday.

Israel’s security cabinet, chaired by Netanyahu, approved a plan last month to expand the nearly two-year-old military campaign in Gaza to take control of Gaza City, which Israeli forces stormed early in the war and waged fierce urban warfare with Hamas. Israel currently holds about 75% of the Gaza Strip.

A security cabinet meeting late on Sunday included angry exchanges between Netanyahu and his ministers, who want to expedite the offensive, and armed forces chief Eyal Zamir, who has urged the politicians to reach a ceasefire deal with Hamas.

Zamir said a military thrust into Gaza City would endanger hostages and further strain the already overstretched army, according to four ministers and two military officials present at the meeting.

Zamir has clashed with the cabinet before. Netanyahu said on August 20 that he had ordered a faster push to take Gaza City, but the next day the military said hostages could be endangered, and that any offensive could not begin for two months, according to a source in Netanyahu's circle and a defence official.

The military said more time was needed for aid to civilians in Gaza, where starvation has spread. But surveys have also shown many reservists are unhappy with the cabinet's plans, some openly accusing the government of lacking a cohesive strategy, a post-war plan for Gaza or a clear benchmark for victory.

"I don't feel like I'm doing anything that really applies significant pressure to have Hamas release the hostages," one combat reservist who has been serving in Gaza since October 7, 2023, when the war began, told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity as he was not authorised to speak publicly.

Though Zamir has publicly questioned the wisdom of a new offensive, he told reservists at one military base on Tuesday that the army was prepared for nothing less than "decisive victory" and would not stop the war until then.

"We are preparing for the continuation of the war; we are going to increase and enhance the strikes of our operation, and that is why we called you," he said.

"We have already begun the ground operation in Gaza - make no mistake," Zamir said. "We are already entering places we have never entered before..."

ISRAELI STRIKES

Gaza health authorities said at least 100 people had been killed by Israeli airstrikes, tank shelling and gunfire across the coastal enclave with scores more wounded on Tuesday.

Among the dead was local journalist Rasmi Salem, medics said. The Hamas-run Gaza government media office put the number of Palestinian journalists killed by Israeli fire in Gaza since the war began at 248.

Outside Gaza City's Al-Shifa hospital, white plastic body bags with corpses were laid out on the street. Crowds wailed for slain relatives.

"We fled (our homes) with nothing. They went to get clothes and food from their homes, to bring clothes for their children and food for themselves... and look now! They came back as martyrs!" said Nasr Nasr, a relative of some of the dead.

The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but has stated that its forces are fighting militants on the outskirts of Gaza City, destroying tunnels and militant infrastructure and seizing weapons.

Other deaths reported on Tuesday included five people who were in a line waiting for food at an aid distribution hub in southern Gaza, Palestinian medics said.

Thirteen more Palestinians, including three children, died of malnutrition and starvation in Gaza over the past 24 hours, the territory's health ministry said on Tuesday. That raised officially reported deaths from such causes to at least 361, including 130 children, the vast majority in recent weeks.

Israel disputes the hunger fatality figures given by the health ministry of Gaza's Hamas-run government, arguing that many deaths were due to other medical causes.

The war began on October 7, 2023, when gunmen led by Hamas attacked southern Israeli communities near the border, killing some 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and taking 251 hostages including children into Gaza, according to Israeli figures.

Over 62,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's air and ground war in Gaza since then, according to Gaza health officials, who do not say how many were militants but have said most of those killed have been women and children.

Ceasefire talks ended in deadlock in July.

Of the 48 remaining hostages, Israeli authorities believe 20 are still alive.

(Reporting by Emily Rose, Maayan Lubell and Steven Scheer in Jerusalem, Nidal al-Mughrabi in Cairo, Dawood Abu Alkas in Gaza City; editing by Peter Graff and Mark Heinrich)