American journalists from various American news networks and agencies who were able to enter the destroyed city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, accompanied by the Israeli occupation army, described that the city had become a ghost town with buildings razed to the ground, after its residents left their homes in search of a safe place in an area that has not known security since the start of the war. .

The Israeli occupation army allowed foreign correspondents to enter the city for the first time since the start of its systematic invasion of the city on May 6.

Journalists (including reporters from CNN, the Associated Press and others) point out that two months ago, before Israeli forces invaded Rafah, the city was home to most of Gaza's population of more than two million and "today it is a covered-up ghost town." "With dust."

The abandoned and bullet-riddled residential buildings were destroyed, their walls were destroyed, and all the windows in all their buildings were smashed. “Bedrooms and kitchens can be seen from the roads dotted with piles of rubble that rise above passing Israeli military vehicles, and only a very small number of civilians remain,” according to the Associated Press.

Israel claims to have nearly defeated the forces of the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas in Rafah - an area that Israel claimed earlier this year as “the last stronghold of the armed Hamas movement in Gaza,” and a city whose invasion by US President Joe Biden’s administration has considered a red line. Israel is prohibited from crossing it.

The Israeli occupation army invited journalists to Rafah on Wednesday, which is the first time that international media has visited the southernmost city in Gaza since its invasion on May 6. Israel has prevented international journalists from independently entering Gaza since the October 7 Hamas attack that sparked the war.

Before the Rafah invasion, Israel said the four remaining Hamas brigades had withdrawn there, an area of about 25 square miles (65 square kilometers) on the border with Egypt. Israel says hundreds of activists were killed in its attack on Rafah. Dozens of women and children were also killed due to Israeli air strikes and ground operations.

The army says it was necessary to operate with such intensity because Hamas had turned civilian areas into treacherous traps.

"Some of these tunnels are booby-trapped," the army's chief spokesman, Admiral Daniel Hagar, said during a tour on Wednesday while standing above a passage leading underground. “Hamas has built everything into a civilian neighborhood between homes, between mosques, and between residents, in order to create its terrorist ecosystem,” according to the Associated Press.

An estimated 1.4 million Palestinians crowded into Rafah after fleeing fighting elsewhere in Gaza. United Nations estimates indicate that about 50,000 people remain in Rafah, whose population before the war was about 275,000 people.

Most have moved to a nearby "humanitarian zone" declared by Israel, where conditions are dangerous. Many are huddled in squalid camps along the shore, with little access to clean water, food, bathrooms and medical care.

Efforts to bring aid into southern Gaza have faltered. The Israeli incursion into Rafah led to the closure of one of the two main crossings into southern Gaza. The United Nations says little aid can enter through the other main crossing - Kerem Shalom - because the road is too dangerous and convoys are vulnerable to attacks by armed groups looking for smuggled cigarettes.

According to journalists who entered Rafah last Wednesday, there was a line of trucks on the Gaza side of the Kerem Shalom crossing, but the trucks were barely moving — a sign of how Israel's pledge to keep the road safe in order to facilitate the delivery of aid into Gaza has failed.

UN officials say some commercial trucks have made their way to Rafah, but not without hired armed guards riding atop their convoys.

“Israel says it is close to dismantling the group as an organized military force in Rafah. In a reflection of this confidence, soldiers brought the journalists in open-air military vehicles on the road leading to the heart of the city,” according to the agency.

Along the way, roadside debris illustrated the dangers facing aid delivery: bodies of trucks lying in the blazing sun; Dashboards covered with fencing intended to protect drivers; Aid pallets lie empty.

Humanitarian organizations say that the longer the aid delivery freeze lasts, the closer Gaza will come to running out of fuel, which is needed for hospitals, desalination plants and vehicles.

“Hospitals are once again suffering from fuel shortages, which threatens to disrupt vital services,” said Dr. Hanan Balkhi, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean. “The wounded are dying because ambulance services are facing delays due to fuel shortages.”

As the humanitarian situation deteriorates, Israel continues its attack. The fighting in Rafah continues.

After reporters heard gunfire nearby on Wednesday, soldiers told the group they would not visit the beach, as planned.

The group left the city shortly after, amid clouds of dust rising from the vehicles, temporarily obscuring the devastation behind them.