The fighting in Israel and Gaza has visitors scrambling to leave
Tribute to Gaza: “It’s a nightmare” for the U.S. and “reconsidering travel in Israel“
Israel is intensifying air strikes on Gaza after the weekend’s surprise air, land and sea attack by Hamas, in which militants killed 1,300 Israelis and took some 150 as hostages.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were already displaced before the Israeli order, many sheltering in U.N.-run schools. The entire territory is under full Israeli siege, with no one allowed out and no fuel, food or even water allowed in. The main Gaza power plant has completely shut.
A senior US official told NPR that it’s trying to get around 400 to 600 U.S. citizens out of Gaza, where 100 have contacted the embassy for help.
The 30-year-old grew up in Gaza, but hadn’t been back since moving to the U.S. seven years ago. Abuzayda and her husband, who is American, had gone back and forth about when exactly to visit.
“We changed our tickets like three to four times … and then we decided to come to Gaza at this time,” she said. “And our short vacation just turned into a nightmare.”
Abuzayda and her husband Abood, and their son Yousef traveled from Massachusetts for a two week trip. They don’t know when they will be able to go home.
Abuzayda said that she called the U.S. embassy multiple times a day for help after the attack. But they told her repeatedly that they didn’t have any updates. Then she tried the embassy in Cairo, to no avail.
She added, “And in the meantime they keep posting stuff about the U.S. citizens in Israel. They remind the people in Israel to leave every five minutes.
And there are many others struggling to leave, since major U.S. airlines have halted flights in and out of the country. The total number is unknown, but New York Rep. Mike Lawler said his district alone has “hundreds of constituents in Israel trying to get home.”
The U.S. increased the travel advisory for Israel and the West Bank on Wednesday to level three, or “reconsider travel.” The Advisory for Gaza remains at level four.
Abuzayda, who is staying at her parents’ house with other relatives, said her sister-in-law and her three kids had tried to cross the Rafah border, but they had to turn back after it came under an Israeli airstrike.
There is no electricity. Abuzayda says she can’t charge her phone for several hours at a time if she doesn’t have fuel. They could lose their connection to the world at any moment because of the sporadic access to communication.
She said it’s not safe outside and inside. The markets are short on supplies. She is trying to make the most of what she has left to keep Yousef safe and happy.
A Gaza hospital evacuated by Israel’s threat against Hamas: “I am afraid I can’t do that, Mommy, but I know I’m going to die”
“The hardest feeling ever is to hide your fear and show the opposite, just to keep my son positive,” she said. “Because he doesn’t understand anything, he thinks this is a fireworks. And every time I tell him, while I’m crying, ‘okay mommy, clap clap this is a fireworks, it’s nothing.’ Sometimes he will jump, he will be scared and freaking out if I’m not next to him.”
She said “please, please save us” as she strained her voice. “Please. I got a one-and-a-half year old child after six cycles of IVF. The embassy has been unresponsive since Saturday. Nobody’s helping, nobody’s getting back to us. Please save us.”
With fears of a ground attack growing stronger, the fighting between Israel and Hamas continued for a seventh day on Friday.
As Israel presses its campaign against Hamas in Gaza and anticipation grows of a planned Israeli ground assault in Gaza, it issued an order to evacuate. Israel launched attacks on Gaza all week in response to last weekend’s incursion by Hamas. Israel’s military has not yet announced a decision on a ground assault.
Within hours of the order, Israel faced opposition, both from Hamas and on the international stage. The UN considers such a movement impossible without devastating humanitarian consequences.
The main hospital in the area is in an area that makes it hard for people to leave and go to the south.
Israel warns more than 1 million people to evacuate northern Gaza: the Norwegian refugee council condemns “forcible transfer” of over 1 million civilians
Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, said the Israeli military demanding that over 1 million civilians in northern Gaza relocate to its south, “absent of any guarantees of safety or return, would amount to the war crime of forcible transfer.”
Meanwhile, the Hamas leadership called on Palestinians to ignore the Israeli order. “If Israel is going to displace us again from our land, we must remain steadfast in our homes,” said Hamas interior ministry spokesman Iyad Al-Bozom.
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees moved its operations center and international staff to the southern part of the Gaza Strip, according to a post on the social media site X.
Hospitals and clinics in Gaza are treating a lot of injured people, but it’s not clear if they can be evacuated. Hospitals are full across Gaza.
In the next few days, food and water will run out in U.N. shelters, Lynn Hastings, the United Nations Resident Coordinator for the Palestinian territories, told NPR. She said that most people in Gaza don’t have access to safe drinking water.
The order also comes as the U.S. ramps up its diplomatic and military support for Israel in the wake of the unprecedented attacks by Hamas that killed at least 1,300 people over the weekend.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is expected to arrive in Israel on Friday, following Thursday’s arrival of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Earlier Friday, Blinken met with King Abdullah II in Amman, Jordan, and was meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the Jordanian capital. The Secretary of State is visiting five countries in the region as he tries to contain the conflict in Gaza.
Palestinian attacks in the Gaza Strip: A warning for Israel, as COVID-19 progresses and the U.S. takes its toll
According to Palestinian officials, more than 1500 people have died in the strikes, while the United Nations reports that 340,000 Palestinians have been displaced. Those numbers will surely rise: Scores of people were killed overnight in Gaza. 17 people were killed in a house in the Bureij camp in central Gaza Strip when it was bombed. Rescue workers were struggling to reach all the areas hit by Israeli bombs.
Israel said Thursday it would not lift its siege of Gaza — even for the transport of humanitarian aid — until Hamas releases all remaining hostages. An unknown number of Americans are believed to be held by the Islamic militant group that rules the Palestinian territory.
The US is trying to find a way to calm the situation in Gaza and Israel, as well as the West Bank and the Middle East.
I agree that a lot of Palestinians don’t agree with this. But unfortunately, in their homes there are missiles shooting at us, [at] my children, on the entire nation of Israel. He said that they have to defend themselves.
Militants infiltrated Israel’s border Saturday using paragliders, motorbikes and boats and fired thousands of rockets toward the country from Gaza. A group went on a rampage at a dance music festival, killing more than 200 people, after overran a police station and military positions. Others raided gated communities and shot families dead, and Israeli officials estimate they took at least 100 hostages to the Gaza Strip.
Airlines and governments around the world were rushing to get visitors trapped by the raging conflict in Israel and the Gaza Strip back home as the U.S. warns any future travelers to the area to rethink their plans.
Tourism is a steady share of Israel’s economy, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. In 2019, it directly accounted for 2.6% of the country’s GDP and 3.8% of total employment. With COVID-19, it dropped substantially as borders closed. As of 2023, the country was still struggling to fully rebound from pre-pandemic levels.
Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport, the country’s largest and busiest, says it is still working as planned. Flights into Israel are still being allowed as Israelis return home.
Delta says it is canceling all flights to Tel Aviv through Oct. 31. American Airlines has suspended operations to and from Tel Aviv through Dec. 4. United has also canceled direct flights.
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters earlier this week that there are “viable ground routes” for Americans if they wanted to leave Israel that way.
Israel’sMinistry of Tourism said that some border posts have limited hours. The agency is providing assistance to those who need it and is operating a hotline via WhatsApp for tourists to stay informed as the situation in Israel evolved.
Tourist Israel, one of the nation’s largest, announced it was offering free transportation to and from the south of Israel for anyone who needs a ride starting on Sunday, Oct. 15. They are also offering shuttle rides to Jordan for a fee.
The 850,000 alumni have been calling their friends in Israel and asking how they are and what they need.
Israel has gone through wars and other brief conflicts in the past, and Birthright Israel has never stopped trips, she said, although they were paused amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
She said that the latest conflict was different than any she had experienced before. “It’s very unclear how long this will take.”
