Dozens of intense airstrikes launched by fighter jets, drones, and tanks have sown panic in Gaza City in the early hours of Tuesday and have launched the ground offensive in the Strip's capital, despite the fact that—after two years of constant forced displacement and no safe place to flee—600,000 civilians remain there. An Israeli military source has formally announced the beginning of the “main phase” of the ground offensive, with the mobilization of two divisions, in a “major step in the deployment of forces and ground operations.”

Residents report constant attacks and tanks in the streets, while troops—after several weeks confined mainly to the outskirts—have begun to"move toward the center" of the city, according to the military source. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls it a"powerful operation," and his Defense Minister, Israel Katz, celebrated in a tweet that"Gaza is burning." All this on the same day that an independent commission of inquiry appointed by the United Nations accused Israel of committing genocide in the tiny Palestinian enclave.

The army, the military source said, has mobilized two divisions, which"will be joined later." The troops will carry out a "combined and gradual" movement into the city, one of the few towns in the Gaza Strip that does not appear completely devastated from the sky, like a lunar landscape. The Armed Forces are keeping the Palestinians confined to just 12% of the enclave—a territory that was already the most densely populated in the world before the invasion—and, after entering the capital, they have been razing neighborhoods with controlled explosions, as can be seen in satellite images. This has been especially the case in the east and surrounding areas. Last week they claimed to control up to 40% of the municipal area, but now the offensive is advancing toward the center of Gaza City.

Before the announcement of the military offensive on the capital a month ago and the start of the latest forced displacement orders, there were around one million people in Gaza City. The Israeli army estimates that 40%—or some 400,000 civilians—have fled.

The massive early morning bombardments, whose power could be heard in central Israel, were the usual prelude to a ground advance. Videos posted on social media allow people to hear the screams as the attacks continued in the darkness.

Hospital morgues have put the death toll at 38 since dawn. Children and adolescents can be seen among the victims in the images. There are 85 deaths between noon on Monday and Tuesday, according to health authorities. Nearly 65,000 deaths, the vast majority of them civilians, in almost two years of war. Every day, the invasion causes dozens of deaths, some of them from starvation, due to the Netanyahu government's strategy of using hunger as a weapon of war. The Hamas-led Health Ministry has announced three more deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total to 428 deaths from hunger, including 146 children.

Netanyahu used his testimony in one of the court cases in which he is charged to announce the start of the operation. Shortly before, the army's Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, issued a statement indicating that troops"have begun dismantling the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza City." "It is a dangerous combat zone. Staying in the city puts you in danger," he warned the population in a tweet.

The ground offensive began just hours after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio took off from Tel Aviv for Qatar after meeting with Netanyahu and appearing at a joint press conference in which he expressed unwavering support for his war strategy.

Already in Qatar, Rubio said that there are"not just months, but days and perhaps a few weeks" left until a possible ceasefire is reached. And he placed all the responsibility on Hamas."The Israelis have begun to operate there [...] Our main option is for this to end through a negotiated agreement in which Hamas says: 'We are going to demilitarize, we will no longer represent a threat,'" he said.

Rubio reiterated what he had stated shortly before, with Netanyahu at his side:"Hamas must cease to exist." Israel and the US agree in demanding that the Islamist movement, which has barely fired rockets at Israel for months and only carried out occasional ambushes of soldiers inside Gaza, hand over its weapons and surrender; and they admit that, even if this happens, they will continue with their plan to militarily control Gaza, maintain troops there, and promote the ethnic cleansing of its population of around two million people.

The Israeli press has reported a clash between Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir and the government during the meeting held by Netanyahu, several of his ministers, and senior military officials on the eve of the offensive launched this Tuesday."The prime minister hasn't told us what the next step is. We don't know what to prepare for. If they want a military government, let them call it 'military government,'" Zamir complained during the meeting, according to these news reports.