Airport in Syria targeted as Israel warns of Gaza offensive

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, based in Britain, and the pro-government Al-Watan daily said an airstrike had hit the runway at Aleppo’s international airport on Saturday – hours after it had repairs had been completed following a similar strike on Thursday. Israeli military did not confirm the airport attack but said it had struck targets in Syria as it fired back following air raid sirens in two villages in northern Israel and the Golan Heights.

Hamas announced on Sunday that three of its members from Lebanon had been killed after crossing the border from Lebanon into Israel. The group said in a statement that its militants had “inflicted losses” before being targeted by Israeli airstrikes. Israel’s military warned in a statement on its website on Saturday night it is “preparing to implement a wide range of offensive operative plans” involving air, ground and naval forces.

No time has been put on when the offensive will begin, but a military spokesman said Israel will strike Gaza City “very soon”. In an address on Saturday night, Rear Adm Daniel Hagari issued a new appeal to residents to move to the southern Gaza Strip. Palestinians are struggling to flee from areas of Gaza targeted by the Israeli military while grappling with a water and medical supplies shortage.

Israel has ordered roughly half of Gaza’s population to evacuate their homes and renewed calls on social media and in leaflets dropped from the air for Gaza residents to move south, while Hamas urged people to stay in their homes. The UN and aid groups say such a rapid exodus along with Israel’s siege of the 25-mile-long territory would cause untold human suffering.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said the evacuation “could be tantamount to a death sentence” for the more than 2,000 patients in northern hospitals, including newborns in incubators and people in intensive care. Gaza’s hospitals are expected to run out of fuel for emergency generations within two days, according to the UN, which said that that would endanger the lives of thousands of patients.

A planeload of WHO supplies has landed at Egypt’s el-Arish airport and is destined for Gaza when humanitarian access across the border is possible, the United Nations said on Saturday. The cache includes enough basic essentials for 300,000 people and enough trauma medicines and materials for 1,200 wounded, the UN said in a release. It called for opening the Rafah border crossing immediately to humanitarian deliveries. “The critically injured, the sick and the vulnerable cannot wait,” the world body said.

US secretary of state Antony Blinken was meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh on Sunday as part of a bid to prevent the Israel-Hamas conflict from becoming a broader regional conflict. The meeting had been expected on Saturday night with Prince Mohammed the sixth Arab leader Mr Blinken has seen in person since he arrived in the Middle East on Thursday, stopping first in Israel to reaffirm the Biden administration’s pledge to stand with and support Israel.

From Israel, Mr Blinken has travelled throughout the region meeting the leaders of Jordan, the Palestinian Authority, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. He plans to visit Egypt on Sunday. The United States is sending a second carrier strike group – the USS Dwight D Eisenhower – to the Eastern Mediterranean to support Israel.

US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said the additional carrier was being sent “as part of our effort to deter hostile actions against Israel or any efforts toward widening this war following Hamas’s attack on Israel.” The Eisenhower will join the USS Gerald R Ford carrier strike group, which is already sailing near Israel, to bolster US presence there with a host of destroyers, fighter aircraft and cruisers.