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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Peter Beaumont in Jerusalem

Israel’s focus turns to Khan Younis as it hunts for Hamas leaders

Destroyed buildings with woman in a room
A woman stands amid the rubble of a building destroyed by Israeli strikes in Khan Younis on Wednesday. Photograph: Ahmed Zakot/Reuters

At the start of Israel’s now more than 60-day offensive in Gaza, its focus was on the north of the territory: Hamas’s leader in Gaza was portrayed as being hunkered down in a bunker disconnected from the world, while its key command centre was said at other times to be located under Dar al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, illustrated by mocked-up graphics in Israeli briefings.

Now, amid a rolling Israeli campaign of huge destruction, the southern city of Khan Younis, the territory’s second biggest urban concentration, is being depicted as Hamas’s stronghold as Israeli tanks move in on an area already overwhelmed by hundreds of thousands of people displaced from Gaza’s north.

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