<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>Smoke rose from strikes on Gaza’s crowded southern city of Rafah today after US president Joe Biden vowed to cut off artillery shells and other weapons supplied to Israel if a full-scale offensive into the city goes ahead.</b></span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It was the starkest warning yet from Israel’s main military provider over the civilian impact of its war against Hamas Palestinian fighters.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">An AFP correspondent and witnesses today reported strikes on several parts of Rafah, where the United Nations said 1.4 million people were sheltering.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“The tanks and jets are striking,” Tarek Bahlul said earlier on a deserted Rafah street.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Every minute you hear a rocket and you don’t know where it will land.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Israel has already defied international objections by sending in tanks and conducting what it called “targeted raids” in the eastern area of Rafah, the city it says is home to Hamas’s last remaining battalions.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In an interview with CNN yesterday, Biden warned he would stop some US weapons supplies to Israel if it pushed ahead with its long-threatened major Rafah ground offensive.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Israel today called Biden’s comments “very disappointing”.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Biden told CNN that, “If they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used, to deal with the cities,” reports AFP&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He added, “We’re not gonna supply the weapons and the artillery shells that have been used.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">When asked about Israel’s action already in Rafah, Biden said “they haven’t gone in the population centres”.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd/fas</div>