Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said that the Palestinian leadership’s priority was to stop a potential Israeli military push into the city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip.
Abbas made the comment on Sunday during a meeting with visiting Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira in Ramallah.
About 1.5 million displaced Palestinians are sheltering in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, Abbas told Vieira.
“Our priority is to stop an assault by Israeli occupation forces on Rafah,” he said, warning that a military operation there would cause a “humanitarian disaster.”
Abbas urged the international community to exert bigger efforts to prevent such an assault, force Israel to immediately stop its aggression on the Palestinian territory, and allow humanitarian aid to enter the enclave.
Despite his call, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he would keep on with the military campaign against Hamas in Gaza.
Netanyahu told a cabinet meeting that Israel would push into Rafah, the last relatively safe place in the tiny, crowded Gaza enclave after more than five months of war, despite international pressure for Israel to avoid civilian casualties.
"We will operate in Rafah. This will take several weeks, and it will happen," he said, without clarifying if he meant the assault would last for weeks or would begin in weeks.
