Ministry: Gaza toll in war tops 30,000

THE Hamas-run health ministry said yesterday more than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war between the militant group and Israel began nearly five months ago.

While mediators say a truce deal between Israel and Hamas could be just days away, aid agencies have sounded the alarm of a looming famine in Gaza’s north.

Children have died “due to malnutrition, dehydration and widespread famine” at Gaza City’s Al-Shifa hospital, said the ministry, whose spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra has called for “immediate action” from international organizations to prevent more of these deaths.

Citing the deteriorating conditions in Gaza, USAID head Samantha Power said Israel needed to open more crossings so that “vitally needed humanitarian assistance can be dramatically surged.”

The latest overall toll for Palestinians killed in the war came after at least 79 people died overnight across the wartorn Gaza Strip, the health ministry said yesterday.

Mediators from Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been seeking a six-week pause in the war sparked by Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, which in response vowed to eliminate the Palestinian Islamist group that rules in Gaza.

Negotiators are hoping a truce can begin by the start of Ramadan, the holy Muslim month that kicks off on March 10 or 11, depending on the lunar calendar.

The proposals reportedly include the release of some Israeli hostages held in Gaza in exchange for several hundred Palestinian detainees held by Israel.

The war was triggered by an unprecedented Hamas attack on south Israel that resulted in the deaths of around 1,160 people, mostly civilians.

Militants also took about 250 hostages, 130 of whom remain in Gaza, including 31 presumed dead.

(AFP)