GAZA/JERUSALEM - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Sunday to “demolish Hamas” as his military prepared ground operations in Gaza to root out the militant group, whose deadly rampage through Israeli border towns stunned the nation.

Israel said residents of north Gaza had a three-hour window closing at 1pm on Sunday to move to the south of the strip, during which an escape corridor would not be attacked.

The Israeli military on Sunday urged Gazans to evacuate ahead of an expected ground assault on the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip in retaliation for unprecedented attacks by the group on Oct 7.

As the window closed and Israeli air strikes continued ahead of ground operations, some Gazans who went south said they had decided to return home to the north because they were attacked from the skies wherever they went.

“What’s the point? They are bombing in Gaza City and they are bombing here in Nusseirt (in the central Gaza Strip), also in Khan Younis and Rafah,” said Mr Abu Dawoud, a Gaza accountant.

“I am taking my family back into Gaza (City). I can’t continue to live in a school or outside my home, when no place is safe anyway, my home is better.”

Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, an intensive care physician in a children’s ward at the Kamal Edwan hospital in the northern Gaza Strip, said the order to evacuate was impossible.

“In this ward as you can see, there are children who are attached to ventilators, and now we have been asked to evacuate the hospital – where should we evacuate these children?” he said.

Mr Netanyahu convened Israel’s expanded emergency Cabinet, including former opposition lawmakers, for the first time on Sunday.

“Hamas thought we would be demolished. It is we who will demolish Hamas,” he said, adding that the show of unity “sends a clear message to the nation, the enemy and the world”.

Israel has vowed to annihilate Hamas in retaliation for the rampage by its fighters in Israeli towns where they shot men, women and children and seized hostages in the worst attack on civilians in the country’s history.

The latest toll of the unexpected onslaught was over 1,400 deaths, and the attack shook the country with horrifying mobile-phone video footage and reports from medical and emergency services of atrocities in the overrun towns and kibbutzes.

The Israeli army said hundreds of thousands of Gazans had already moved south as the city was subjected to the most intense bombardment it has ever seen, putting the small enclave, home to 2.3 million Palestinians, under total siege and destroying much of its infrastructure.

The Gaza authorities said more than 2,450 people have been killed, a quarter of them children, and nearly 10,000 wounded.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said early on Sunday that 300 people, mostly children and women, had been killed, and 800 more injured in Gaza during the last 24 hours.

The expected ground assault had not begun by Sunday afternoon.

Amid international pleas to protect civilians, Israel’s military said it would continue to allow Gazans to evacuate south.

“Residents of Gaza City, I call upon you again: Hamas is trying to prevent your evacuation. We will enable it southward. Leave Gaza City and all the surrounding areas for the sake of your personal security,” said chief Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari in a televised briefing.

Hamas told people not to leave, saying roads out were unsafe. It said dozens of people had been killed in strikes on cars and trucks carrying refugees last Friday.

Some residents said they would not leave, remembering the “Nakba”, or “catastrophe”, when many Palestinians were forced from their homes during the 1948 war that accompanied Israel’s creation.

“They are striking us but we are not going to leave our homes and we will not be displaced,” said Ms Shaheen, sitting at home with her grandchildren facing relentless Israeli bombardment and shortages of bread, water and power.

Containing the conflict

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in the region seeking to secure the release of 126 hostages that Israel says were taken by Hamas back into Gaza, and to prevent the war from spreading.

The United States’ top diplomat said he had a “very productive” meeting with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh on Sunday. Mr Blinken will travel to Israel again on Monday.

The de facto Saudi ruler said his country was working hard to try to prevent the conflict from escalating and wanted to help lift the Israeli siege of Gaza.

The violence in Gaza has been accompanied by the deadliest clashes at Israel’s northern border with Lebanon since 2006, raising fears of war spreading to another front.

On Sunday, Iran-backed Hezbollah fighters launched a missile at an Israeli border village, killing one person and wounding three others. The Israeli military said it was striking at Lebanon in retaliation.

Hamas said in a statement that it and Iran had “agreed to continue cooperation” to achieve the group’s goals.

US President Joe Biden and other world leaders warned against any country broadening the conflict.

International organisations and aid groups urged calm and pressed Israel to allow humanitarian assistance to get through.

In New York, Russia asked the United Nations Security Council to vote on Monday on a draft resolution on the Israel-Hamas conflict that calls for a humanitarian ceasefire and condemns violence against civilians and all acts of terrorism.

Israel says Hamas is preventing people from leaving in order to use them as human shields, which the group denies.

The only route out of Gaza not under Israeli control was a checkpoint with Egypt in Rafah.

Egypt officially says its side is open, but traffic has been halted for days because of Israeli strikes. Egyptian security sources said the Egyptian side was being reinforced, and Cairo had no intention of accepting a mass influx of refugees.

Israel said its evacuation order was a humanitarian gesture while it roots out Hamas fighters. But the UN said so many people could not be safely moved within Gaza without causing a humanitarian disaster.

Mr Netanyahu’s government also told militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon, which neighbours Israel to the north, not to start a war on a second front, threatening the “destruction of Lebanon” if it did.

Syria, which also borders Israel and has ties to Iran, has accused Israel of carrying out strikes against its airports, while Israel has accused Iran of trying to smuggle weapons through Syria. REUTERS