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IDF: There is No Humanitarian Disaster in Rafah
(Jerusalem Post) Margot Dudkevitch - "There is no humanitarian disaster in Rafah, no starvation or insufficient water," Brig.-Gen. Shmuel Zakai, the Gaza divisional commander, said Friday. Zakai also cited an example of the cynical use made by the terrorists of the civilian population. "A group of armed terrorists was shooting at our troops and wanted to cross the road. They grabbed a young Palestinian boy and used him as a shield as they crossed and continued shooting at soldiers, fully aware that our soldiers would not shoot back because of the boy," he said. The IDF is investigating the death of a three-year-old girl who Palestinians claim was shot in the Brazil neighborhood on Saturday. "To our knowledge and according to initial findings, no soldiers shot in the vicinity where the girl was located," a military official said. Since the beginning of Operation Rainbow, a total of five houses have been demolished, and all were structures used by terrorists to shoot at troops or detonate bombs, said Zakai. He said almost all the footage broadcast by the Palestinians to the world were of houses demolished over the past three and a half years, and not recently. "They recycled old footage....None of those broadcast were destroyed in recent days, weeks, or months," he said. Regarding footage of plowed up roads, Zakai said these were the result of terrorists placing bombs underneath the road surface and covering them up with asphalt, so as to detonate as troops entered the camp. Similarly, many of the damaged houses documented by Palestinians are a product of powerful explosives placed by terrorists inside the walls of houses to harm IDF troops searching the area. Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Moshe Ya'alon said, "Even if we won't be in the Gaza Strip, we will have to ensure there is no terror. We will defend Ashdod and Nahal Oz, but if the terror continues we will re-enter Rafah and Zeitun [in Gaza City]."