Israel-Hamas war: Biden urges plan to protect Rafah refugees

US President Joe Biden cautioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that any military action in Rafah must include a "credible" plan to safeguard the safety of Palestinians seeking shelter there.

In a phone call with Netanyahu, Biden "reaffirmed his view that a military operation in Rafah should not proceed without a credible and executable plan for ensuring the safety of and support for the more than one million people sheltering there."

A White House statement said the two leaders "agreed to remain in close contact."

Biden also stressed that the US shared Israel's goal "to see Hamas defeated and to ensure the long-term security of Israel and its people." He also discussed the effort to secure the release of the remaining hostages.

Fighting has intensified in the Rafah border area of the Gaza Strip, despite international warnings due to the presence of hundreds of thousands of war-displaced civilians.

Netanyahu directed Israel's military to plan for the "evacuation of the population and destroying" Hamas in Rafah on Friday.

In an interview with the US television network ABC Netanyahu said those warning against an incursion into Rafah "are basically saying, lose the war."

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock will soon make her fifth visit to the Middle East since Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel and the subsequent military retalliation. 

A Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Sunday that she would travel in the middle of the coming week, and planned to urge a cease-fire as Israel prepares to advance on Rafah. 

Baerbock had already alluded to her upcoming visit on social media over the weekend, in a post where she warned that a military operation in Rafah, where roughly half of Gaza's population has fled, would risk a "humanitarian catastrophe." She said that Gaza's population could not "vanish into thin air." 

Bearbock said "another pause in fighting is needed — also so that the hostages can finally be released," and added that she would be discussing ways to achieve this in Israel on her upcoming visit.

Prior to her latest trip to the Middle East, Baerbock has talks scheduled with her French and Polish counterparts in Paris on Monday, while Poland's new and returning Prime Minister Donald Tusk is visiting Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin. 

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said Sunday its forces carried out strikes on two unmanned surface vessels (USVs) and three anti-ship cruise missiles north of Yemen's port city of Hodeidah.

CENTCOM said the military equipment was a threat to ships in the area. Hodeidah lies along the Red Sea, near the Gulf of Aden.

"CENTCOM identified these USVs and missiles in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen and determined they presented an imminent threat to US Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region," it added.

The Houthi-run Al-Masirah television reported on Saturday night three strikes on the Salif port area.

The US and its allies have stepped up retaliation on Houthi positions after the Iran-backed militants, who control much of Yemen, staged repeated attacks on vital Red Sea shipping lanes.

Insurance premiums for shipping companies have soared as a result, forcing many to avoid the Red Sea, a vital route that normally carries about 12% of global maritime trade.

The Houthis began their attacks in November, saying they were hitting Israel-linked vessels in support of Palestinians in Gaza, which has been ravaged by the Israel-Hamas war.

On Friday, a German frigate departed the North Sea port of Wilhelmshaven to join a planned EU mission to the Red Sea.

Any Israeli offensive toward Rafah would "blow up" the negotiations between Hamas and Israel on freeing remaining hostages, Hamas-run Aqsa Television quoted a militant leader as saying on Sunday.

Israel has said it is planning a ground assault on Rafah to destroy four Hamas battalions they claim to be stationed in the area. Many Western officials have criticized the plan, saying the ground war in Rafah would prompt a humanitarian disaster for the around 1.3 million people sheltering there.

Hamas is now warning Israel that such an attack would undermine talks on freeing the remaining hostages.

Israeli officials have said that a ground operation in the last Gazan city — following operations in Gaza City and Khan Younis — is the only way to secure the release of the hostages.

It is estimated that over a hundred people are still held by Hamas out of some 250 captured in the raids on October 7. Many of them have been freed in exchange for Israel releasing Hamas prisoners, while dozens are believed to have died during the war.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu  equated calls against attacking Rafah to calls for Israel to "lose the war."

"Those who say that under no circumstances should we enter Rafah are basically saying lose the war, keep Hamas there," Netanyahu told the US broadcaster ABC in an interview set to be published on Sunday.

Previously, multiple high-ranking Western officials expressed concerns over the attack on the city on the Egyptian border, which has become home to over 1 million refugees who have fled the fighting in the rest of the enclave.

"The people in Gaza cannot disappear into thin air," German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock wrote on X, formerly Twitter, urging a ceasefire and adding that an Israeli offensive on Rafah would be a "humanitarian catastrophe in the making."

Her British colleague David Cameron also said he was "[d]eeply concerned about the prospect of a military offensive in Rafah — over half of Gaza’s population are sheltering in the area."

"The priority must be an immediate pause in the fighting to get aid in and hostages out," he added.

But talking to ABC, the right-wing prime minister said Israel was working on a "detailed plan" to move civilians into previously cleared areas of Gaza.

"This is part of our war effort to get civilians out of harm's way; it's part of Hamas's effort to keep them in harm's way," he said.

Separately, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that continuing the offensive would bring Israel "closer to a realistic deal for the return of the hostages" still held captive by Hamas.

"We've penetrated to the most sensitive core of Hamas — their intelligence is now being used against them," he said.

But many Israelis are angry at the government's inability to secure the release of the hostages some four months since they were first taken into Gaza.

Reporting from Jerusalem, DW's Tania Krämer said that people she had spoken to in Rafah were "extremely worried" about Israel's plans to extend its operations to the border towns as they do not know where the over 1 million refugees will be able to go to avoid the fighting.

With 112 Palestinians killed in the last 24 hours, the Gaza death toll has now reached 28,176, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.

The ministry officials also said a total of 67,784 Palestinians were injured in the Israeli campaign that has now been ongoing for over four months.

The Hamas-run authorities do not distinguish between combatant and civilian casualties, but the UN and multiple humanitarian organizations consider their numbers to be broadly reliable.

Around half of Gaza's 2.3 million inhabitants are minors, and Hamas claims that most of the casualties in the war are women and children.

The war started as a response to the Hamas terror attack on October 7. Hamas is considered a terror organization by the US, the EU, Germany and many others.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Israeli military would provide "safe passage for the civilian population" ahead of an expected assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah. He also rejected fears of a "catastrophe," as expressed by a growing number of international organizations and diplomats.

Despite the international alarm over the planned operation in Rafah, Netanyahu told ABC News in an interview that the offensive was essential to crushing Hamas. 

"Victory is within reach. We're going to do it. We're going to get the remaining Hamas terrorist battalions and Rafah, which is the last bastion, but we're going to do it," he said.

"We're going to do it while providing safe passage for the civilian population so they can leave," he added, mentioning that Israel is working on a plan to do so.

According to Netanyahu, areas north of Rafah that have been cleared of Hamas could be used as safe zones for civilians.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned that an Israeli offensive on Rafah "would lead to an unspeakable humanitarian catastrophe and grave tensions with Egypt."

"Resuming negotiations to free hostages and suspend hostilities is the only way to avert a bloodshed," Borrell posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

British Foreign Secretary David Cameron also said he was "deeply concerned about the prospect of a military offensive in Rafah."

"The priority must be an immediate pause in the fighting to get aid in and hostages out," Cameron wrote.

The Israeli military has claimed the discovery of a Hamas tunnel under the headquarters of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in Gaza City. The UNRWA said it had vacated the premises in October.

The Israeli military took reporters on a tour of the tunnel. However, the lack of a mobile signal in the tunnel made it impossible to geolocate it and confirm it was indeed below the UNRWA headquarters, the Reuters news agency said.

"Everything is conducted from here. All the energy for the tunnels, which you walked through them are powered from here," Reuters cited a lieutenant-colonel, who gave only his first name, Ido, as saying during the tour.

He was referring to a side room in the tunnel packed with industrial battery stacks. Israel claimed the tunnel was powered by electricity supplied from the UNRWA headquarters.

UNRWA said its staff were forced to leave the headquarters on October 12, under Israeli instructions. It added that it had not used the facility since vacating and was not "aware of any activity that may have taken place there." 

Gaza City, where the headquarters is based, was among the first regions of the enclave where Israel's ground offensive was focused.

The UN agency said it "does not have the military and security expertise nor the capacity to undertake military inspections of what is or might be under its premises." 

UNRWA has come under fire in recent weeks after Israel alleged that members of its staff were involved in the deadly October 7 terror attacks, which Israel says left around 1,200 killed. 

The agency fired 12 staff members  and probed the allegations, but, in the process, many of its major donors have frozen their aid contributions, including Germany and the US.