Gazans face 'grave risk of genocide,' warns Amnesty International over Netanyahu's offensive plan on Rafah

Amnesty International on Friday issued a stark warning, asserting that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's orders to his army to plan an offensive on Rafah in the Gaza Strip pose a "grave risk of genocide" for civilians.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday directed the army to submit a military plan to evacuate civilians from Rafah and defeat Hamas battalions there.

Amnesty International Secretary General Agnes Callamard raised poignant questions on X regarding the feasibility and safety of evacuation measures, highlighting the dire situation facing civilians in Gaza.

"Evacuation?? BUT WHERE? There is nowhere to go to," Callamard responded to the evacuation orders issued for Palestinians in Rafah, saying, "There is nowhere to go."

"The international community has an obligation to act to prevent genocide," he urged.

Estimates indicate that around 1.4 million Palestinians reside in Rafah after the Israeli army forced hundreds of thousands of people in the northern Gaza Strip to evacuate to the south.

Despite the International Court of Justice's provisional ruling, Israel continues its onslaught on the Gaza Strip where at least 27,947 Palestinians have been killed, mostly women and children, and 67,459 injured since Oct. 7, according to Palestinian health authorities.

Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since a cross-border attack by Hamas, which Tel Aviv says killed nearly 1,200 people.

The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza's population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure was damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.