Israel-Hamas War - What happened on day 69?

Four soldiers from the 603rd Engineering Battalion, Combat Engineering Corps, as well as an additional officer from Golani's 12th Battalion, were seriously injured in battle in the southern Gaza Strip, according to a report by the IDF.

Another three were injured in a separate battle in the southern Gaza Strip.

All were evacuated for immediate medical treatment, with their respective families informed.

IDF's 12th Battalion commander hurt in Gaza fighting

One of the injured was the lieutenant colonel and commander of the 12th Battalion, who had already replaced the previously injured commander.

This came a day after 10 IDF soldiers were killed and six were wounded, marking a series of difficult days in terms of IDF soldier casualties.

IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi speaks to Israeli soldiers on December 14, 2023 (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)

Despite those benchmarks, only 12 rocket sirens sounded on Thursday, with no hits, and many of the rockets were in the North, marking a low for rockets from Hamas in the recent time period since the late November temporary ceasefire.

There were at least three rounds of exchanges of fire between the IDF and Hezbollah in the North, with the Lebanese terror group attacking with rockets and anti-tank missiles and the IDF striking back with air strikes and artillery.

However, there were fewer public statements about escalation from the sides as the week wore on.

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Thursday told US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan that it will take more than a few more months to finish off the Gaza War with Hamas.

Although this would seem to pit Israel in serious tension with the US timeframe for finishing the war in the coming weeks, the Jerusalem Post has clarified that Gallant was referring to the expected counter-insurgency stage of fighting Hamas.

In other words, Gallant and other defense officials would still stand by the end of January as an expected endpoint for the main invasion will the full volume of multiple IDF divisions involved.

Rather, even after the main invasion is considered concluded and IDF forces in Gaza are reduced to a number which can be maintained over a longer period, it has been expected that the IDF will need to fight smaller battles against insurgents for three to nine months.

The defense minister explained that Hamas had spent years creating its terror forces and infrastructure and that taking all of this vast network apart, would require much longer than the initial full invasion stage.

Gallant thanked the US "for its unqualified support."

Sullivan is visiting Israel at a critical point in the conflict with the Biden administration seeking to decide how much longer it will go on protecting Israel from global pressure for an immediate ceasefire. In addition, the two governments have engaged in a series of unusually public jabs at each other about if and to what extent the Palestinian Authority will be involved in running Gaza once Israel withdraws.

In addition, the defense minister said he discussed with Sullivan the question of how to neutralize the threat posed to Israel by Hezbollah in the North.

Along with that issue, Gallant explained how important it is to create new security realities which will allow Israel's tens of thousands of evacuees from the North to return to their homes.

The US has significantly pressured Israel not to engage in a broader fight with Hezbollah and Jerusalem has hoped that Washington will repay some of its restraint by leaning hard on the terror group to keep its forces farther away from the northern border than it has since the 2006 Second Lebanon War.

After that war, UN Security Council Resolution 1701 mandated that Hebzollah stay out of southern Lebanon, but shortly after, the group systematically violated those limits.

In addition, Gallant said Israel welcomes a global approach to holding off maritime threats from the Yemen Houthis, though he said any attack on an actual Israeli ship would lead to a direct Israeli response.

Trying to bring down Gaza’s top leaders, the IDF distributed flyers across Gaza on Thursday, promising huge rewards to anyone who would provide information on the locations of senior Hamas leaders hiding in the Strip.

The flyers state that $400,000 is being offered for information on Hamas leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, and $300,000 for his brother Muhammad Sinwar.

A lower reward, worth $200,000, will be awarded by the IDF to those who provide information on the location of Rafa Salama, the Khan Yunis Brigade commander; for the location of Mohammed Deif, the head of Hamas's military wing, the army will give $100,000.

"Confidentiality is guaranteed," the IDF states in the flyer, and a phone number is provided to call.

IDF makes progress in Gaza's north and south

Also, on Thursday, the IDF made slow but steady progress in both northern and southern Gaza.

IDF troops from the 460th Combat Brigade of the 162nd Division operated in the Kamal Adwan Hospital area with the Shin Bet, with scores of Hamas terrorists being killed or detained.

During the operation, the IDF troops located a building close to the hospital that was being used by Hamas terrorists. An exchange of fire took place, in which a number of Hamas terrorists were killed.

Some 70 terrorists surrendered and left the building with their weapons and were detained and taken for interrogation by the Shin Bet.

This was one of several rounds of large-scale surrenders in recent days, though IDF sources indicate Hamas is still far from completely cracking.

Kamal Adwan Hospital is in the Beit Lahiya area north of Gaza City, near the Israeli border.

In mid-October, various media outlets quoted Hussam Abu Safiya, head of pediatrics at the hospital in northern Gaza, saying it did not evacuate despite calls to do so by Israel. The UN had warned at the time that hospitals would run out of fuel in two days on October 15.

The fuel continued to flow despite the warnings. On November 4, CNN reported that “MedGlobal, a US-based organization that supports local health programs for vulnerable populations across the globe, issued an urgent appeal for fuel to power a generator at Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza.”

Danish intelligence services and the Copenhagen Police made several arrests on Thursday in a coordinated effort against a suspected terrorist attack. Israeli authorities said the suspects had been acting on behalf of Hamas, with the aim of killing civilians on European soil.

"In recent years, and even more so after the murderous attack on October 7, Hamas strives to expand its operational capabilities around the world, and in Europe in particular," Israeli authorities said, "to realize its ambitions to strike Israeli, Jewish, and Western targets at any cost." 

The arrests were "carried out in close collaboration with our foreign partners," Flemming Drejer, who heads Denmark's Security and Intelligence Service, said, according to the AP. "Persons abroad have been charged."

"This is extremely serious," Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said to reporters at the European Union Summit in Brussels. "It is of course, completely unacceptable in relation to Israel and Gaza, that there is someone who takes a conflict somewhere else in the world into Danish society."

A cargo ship reported a missile hitting the water as it sailed up the Bab al-Mandab Strait off Yemen, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said on Thursday.

The ship also said it had been instructed to change course and sail to Yemen, the UKMTO said in an advisory note.

The crew of the Hong Kong-flagged, Marshall Islands-owned vessel were not harmed in the incident, which occurred approximately 45 kilometers northwest of Mocha, Yemen, British maritime security company Ambrey said in a separate advisory.

Ambrey said the ship had reported a group claiming to be the "Yemeni Navy" had demanded the change in course.

It said it believes the group is Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis.

The Houthis have sought to support the Palestinians in Gaza by firing missiles at Israel and threatening shipping in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, which lies next to Yemen at the southern entrance to the Red Sea.

The UKMTO and Ambrey said they were investigating the incident and another involving a vessel sailing in the Indian Ocean off Yemen.

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Thursday told US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan that it will take more than a few more months to finish off the Gaza war with Hamas.

Although this would seem to pit Israel in serious tension with the US timeframe for finishing the war in the coming weeks, the Jerusalem Post has clarified that Gallant was referring to the expected counter-insurgency stage of fighting Hamas.

In other words, Gallant and other defense officials would still stand by the end of January as an expected endpoint for the main invasion will the full volume of multiple IDF divisions involved.

Rather, even after the main invasion is considered concluded and IDF forces in Gaza are reduced to a number which can be maintained over a longer period, it has been expected that the IDF will need to fight smaller battles against insurgents for three to nine months.

The defense minister explained that Hamas had spent years creating its terror forces and infrastructure and that taking all of this vast network apart would require much longer than the initial full invasion stage.

Gallant thanked the US "for its unqualified support."

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told visiting White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Thursday that it will take several months to defeat Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Gallant said that for over a decade Hamas has been building its "infrastructure under the ground and above the ground" and that to destroy the Islamist group "it will require a long period of time - it will last more than several months, but we will win and we will destroy them."

The two also discussed the need to return Israelis to their homes near the border with Lebanon after tens of thousands of people were displaced due to fighting with Iran-backed Hezbollah, according to statement from Gallant's office.

Commanders for Israel’s Security (CIS) has proposed to the government war cabinet to offer Hamas’s leadership expulsion, along with Palestinian security prisoners, in exchange for a return of their Israeli hostages.

Former IDF deputy chief Maj. Gen. and CIS chief (the group includes over 500 top former defense and intelligence officials ) Matan Vilnai clarified to the Jerusalem Post that there are significant details of the offer which the government would still need to iron out itself.

For example, when Israel offered a similar deal to PLO Chief Yasir Arafat in Lebanon in 1982, many thousands of his fighters were given free passage-expelled along with him.

Vilnai told the Post that how many Hamas officials would be given free passage out of Gaza, whether 10, 100, or thousands, was something the war cabinet would need to think through.

Further, Vilnai said to the Post that the war cabinet would need to decide whether Islamic Jihad leaders and terrorists would be included in the free passage-expulsion deal.

A meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan will take place Thursday afternoon at the Kirya military base in Tel Aviv, according to the Prime Minister's office.

In addition to Sullivan, the National Security Adviser and Head of the National Security Council Tzahi Hanegbi, as well as the US President's Special Envoy for the Middle East Brett McGurk were all in the meeting.

This is a developing story.

Britain said it had adopted a new sanctions regime against Iran on Thursday as it announced measures against seven individuals, including the head of Tehran's Quds Force, for threatening or planning the destabilization of Israel.

The British government said the new regime, which it said gave it greater powers to act against Iran and its decision-makers, had been brought in response to "unprecedented threats" from Tehran to peace in the Middle East and to plots to kill individuals in Britain.

"The behavior of the Iranian regime poses an unacceptable threat to the UK and our partners," foreign minister David Cameron said in a statement.

"It continues to threaten people on UK soil and uses its influence to destabilize the Middle East through its support to armed groups, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ)."

Those subject to travel bans and asset freezes under the new sanctions included Esmail Qaani, the head of the Quds Force, which is the arm of Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) that controls its allied militia from Lebanon to Iraq and Yemen to Syria.

Copenhagen police and the Danish intelligence service said on Thursday they had made several arrests in a coordinated action across the country on suspicion of preparation for a terrorist attack. The plot is likely related to the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

The arrests were "carried out in close collaboration with our foreign partners," said Flemming Drejer, who heads Denmark's Security and Intelligence Service, according to AP. "Persons abroad have been charged."

"This is extremely serious," Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said to reporters at the European Union Summit in Brussels. "It is of course, completely unacceptable in relation to Israel and Gaza, that there is someone who takes a conflict somewhere else in the world into Danish society."

Denmark currently has its terror threat level set to "serious," the second-highest. Drejer said that the country was not planning to change that assessment in response to this threat.

He said the case had "threads abroad," the AP reported, and "was related to criminal gangs," in particular the Loyal to Familia gang, which was banned by a Danish court in January 2020.

In a video circulating on social media, an IDF soldier can be seen reciting the Shema Yisrael prayer in a mosque in Jenin, where the military is currently operating extensively against terrorist infrastructure.

The IDF responded to the circulating footage, stating that such demeanor is deemed "unacceptable." Later, the Israeli military confirmed that the soldiers involved were suspended from all operational activities.

"The soldiers' conduct in the video is unacceptable and contradicts the IDF's core values," the IDF said, adding that they will also be disciplined accordingly.