Gaza City, October 31 (RHC)-- A spokesman for the military wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad resistance movement has dismissed Israel’s alleged ground advances in its war of aggression against the besieged Gaza Strip.

“The [Israeli] enemy is depicting a false picture of its attempts to penetrate our land,” Abu Hamza, who speaks for the al-Quds Brigades, said in a video statement on Monday.  He added that Palestinian resistance fighters have inflicted heavy losses on the Israeli forces in many areas.

Abu Hamza emphasized that all Palestinian resistance factions “continue to confront the miserable ground maneuvers carried out by the enemy’s army in an attempt to restore confidence” among its forces.  He added that Israeli forces were in fact lured into “ambushes of terror and death” in Gaza.

His remarks came after earlier on Monday, the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas said Israeli tanks that had advanced near Gaza were forced to retreat after heavy clashes.

“There’s absolutely no ground advance inside the residential neighborhoods in the Gaza Strip. What happened on Salah al-Din Street was the incursion of a few occupation army tanks and a bulldozer,” said Salama Maarouf, the head of the Hamas office in Gaza.

Elsewhere in his remarks, the spokesman for al-Quds Brigades said: “The results of Operation al-Aqsa Storm have appeared clearly on the enemy’s internal scene,” adding that the battle will witness a shift in favor of the resistance at all levels.

Abu Hamza also addressed the families of Israeli captives in the Gaza Strip, saying: “Your leadership is risking your children in order to buy time.”  The spokesman warned, “Every minute that passes poses a threat to the lives of captives held by the resistance amid the barbaric bombardment of Gaza.”

He added that some of the captives have already lost their lives in Israel’s indiscriminate strikes.

Abu Hamza emphasized that Palestinian resistance movements will not allow Israel to exploit negotiations on the release of captives to achieve its goals.

Israel has killed more than 8,300 Palestinians civilians, mostly women and children, since October 7. Over 21,000 others have been injured.

The regime was caught off-guard by the surprise Operation al-Aqsa Storm that Gaza-based resistance movements conducted on that October day.  The operation was a response to Israel’s continuing violations of the rights of Palestinians in the occupied territories.