Israel builds up forces for Gaza offensive

JERUSALEM, Sept 03 (AFP): Israeli reservists began responding to call-up orders on Tuesday, swelling the military's ranks ahead of a planned offensive to capture Gaza City after nearly two years of devastating war.

Despite mounting pressure at home and abroad to end its campaign, Israel has recently been stepping up operations as it lays the groundwork for seizing the Palestinian territory's largest urban centre.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed at least 85 people on Tuesday across the Strip, which has been in the grips of a major humanitarian crisis for months.

In Tel Aviv on Tuesday, a group of reservists refusing to serve in the war and calling themselves "Soldiers for the Hostages" held a public event urging their fellow reservists and active-duty soldiers not to report for service.

Max Kresch, a member of the 400-strong group, said that as a veteran who had already served in the war, it was his "patriotic duty to refuse to take part". Continuing the hostilities instead of striking a deal to free the hostages taken by Hamas, he added, was a "betrayal" of both the captives and the Israeli people.

Israeli media has reported that around 40,000 reservists were being mobilised in the first wave.

The UN estimates that nearly a million people live in and around Gaza City, where a famine has been declared.

Army chief Eyal Zamir told reservists reporting for duty on Tuesday they were being deployed to "enhance the strikes of our operation".

The military has intensified its bombardment of Gaza City, and has been operating on its outskirts in recent days. "We are already entering places we have never entered before," Zamir said.

In his own message to the troops, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu credited them with advancing "Israel towards a sweeping victory", adding they were now at "the decisive stage".

Weary Palestinians in Gaza City told AFP they felt helpless and desperate ahead of the looming offensive.

"There is no place for us to go, and no means to get there. We are exhausted physically and mentally from displacement and from the war," 60-year-old Amal Abdel-Aal, who lives in a tent in the city's west, told AFP by telephone.

In a post on X on Tuesday, a military spokesman warned Gazans of the upcoming "expansion of combat operations towards Gaza City".

"We wish to remind you that in Al-Mawasi enhanced services will be provided, with an emphasis on access to medical care, water and food," Avichay Adraee said, referring to an area in the south that Israel has designated a humanitarian zone but which has been hit by repeated strikes.