After a dramatic week in Gaza, where does the war stand?
The Rafah offensive has not really begun, and a ceasefire is probably still weeks away at best
FOR MONTHS diplomats in the Middle East have obsessed over two issues. One is the stop-start effort to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, which would see the group release some of its hostages. The other is the long-threatened Israeli offensive in Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, now home to 1.5m people displaced from elsewhere in the enclave. It was a stark choice: either a deal to pause the war or an offensive to widen it.
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This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “Running in place”
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