Israel rejects international pressure to avoid spreading the war to Rafah, at the southern end of the Gaza Strip.
''Our army - said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a military ceremony - will continue to fight against all Hamas battalions, including in Rafah.
Rafah is the last stronghold of Hamas.
Anyone who tells us not to act there is asking us to lose the war.
This will not happen''.
Netanyahu reiterated that Israel's objectives are the ''elimination of the wicked Hamas regime, the recovery of the hostages and the removal of new threats to Israel from Gaza''.
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