US President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday that a major ground offensive in Gaza's Rafah would be a "mistake", as the two leaders spoke for the first time in a month amid growing tensions.


The call came as Biden and Netanyahu took a series of veiled swipes at each other over the last several days, with Biden saying in a hot mic moment last week that he would have a "come to Jesus meeting" with the Israeli leader.


White House national security advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters on Monday that Biden and Netanyahu had a "businesslike" call and that Netanyahu agreed to send a technical team of senior military, intelligence and humanitarian officials to Washington in the coming days to discuss the next stages of the war.


First and foremost on Biden's agenda is preventing a full-scale Israeli invasion of Rafah, the southern Gaza border town where 1.5 million Palestinians are sheltering in squalid conditions.


"The president explained why he is so deeply concerned about Israel conducting major military operations on Rafah," Sullivan said.
Israel threatened to invade Rafah in early February.
The Biden administration pushed back against the plan but stopped short of issuing a full red line over an assault, saying Israel first needed to ensure a plan to evacuate Palestinian civilians.

On Monday, Sullivan told reporters that "Israel has not presented us or the world with a plan for how or where they would safely move those civilians and ensure basic access to things like sanitation".


Sullivan said Biden warned Netanyahu against a full-scale invasion of Rafah.


"A major ground operation there would be a mistake, it would lead to more innocent civilian deaths, worsen the already dire humanitarian crisis, deepen the anarchy in Gaza, and further isolate Israel internationally," he said.


The call comes as talks to reach a hostage deal between Hamas and Israel stall. The Biden administration has hoped that a six-week truce that allows for the release of hostages could give them space to work out a longer-term ceasefire and de-escalate tensions in the region, ahead of the November US presidential election.

[AI]

Rain a little while ago in the city of Rafah

May God help our people who are now in displacement camps and schools, and those who are sleeping on the ground, and those who are homeless in the open, on the sidewalks of the roads and on top of the rubble of their homes, and those who do not have clothes to protect them from the cold of winter and do not have blankets.

[GG]

🔻 The Palestinian resistance fires a batch of mortar bombs towards the occupation vehicles invading the vicinity of the Shifa complex

[GG]

🔺 Update | 14 were killed as a result of Zionist air strikes that targeted homes and apartments in the city of Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip.

[GG]

🔺️A night mixed with Israeli bombing, heavy rain, and strong winds throughout the Gaza Strip.

Rain, bombing, and martyrs

[A.k]

🔺 Martyrs and wounded as a result of the occupation bombing of the Al-Hashash family home in Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip

[GG]

🇸🇾 An Israeli security source told Al Arabiya channel:

The Syrian people will pay a heavy price.. The Syrian army is working to deliver weapons to southern Lebanon and to the Palestinian factions.

The source confirmed that continued Syrian support will lead to a complete change in the scene, and the Syrians will pay a heavy price.



[AI]

🔺️A father bids goodbye to his two-month-old baby, who was killed by an Israeli airstrike. In the past 5 months Israel has killed over 14,000 children.

How many more children need
to die before all this ends ?

[A.k]

🔺️The only survivor: a child whose entire family died in an Israeli occupation bombing of Rafah

[A.k]

🇸🇾 Syrian Ministry of Defense:
—
Around 2:10 AM, the "israeli" enemy launched an air aggression from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting a number of military points in the Damascus countryside. Our air defense forces responded to the aggression’s missiles and shot down some of them, and the losses were limited to material.


[AI]

🔻 Occupation forces were targeted by bullets during the storming of Mythlon🔥🔥

[GG]

🔻 Violent armed clashes between the Mujahideen and the occupation forces in the town of Maithalun, south of Jenin ❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥

[GG]

Clashes now between the resistance and occupation forces 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

[GG]

🔺️Gaza

A french serving in the Israeli military displaying Palestinians kidnapped from Gaza.

The soldier says “"You will see his back... LOOK HOW WE TORTURED HIM"

[A.k]

Spain's foreign minister:

27 EU countries agreed on sanctions against settlers who use violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.


[AI]