ISRAEL PRESSES ON BRUTAL STRIKES IN GAZA
Witnesses said that strikes hit the Nuseirat refugee camp, with clashes also reported in other areas of central and northern Gaza
Israel struck war-battered Gaza overnight, witnesses said, as world leaders urged de-escalation awaiting Israel’s reaction to Iran’s attack that heightened fears of wider conflict.
The Israeli military said it would not be distracted from its war against Palestinian groups in Gaza, triggered by October 7 attack.
“Even while under attack from Iran, we have not lost sight... of our critical mission in Gaza to rescue our captives from the hands of Hamas,” military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said.
As mediators eye a deal to halt the fighting, fears persisted over Israeli plans to send ground troops into Rafah, a far-southern city where the majority of Gaza’s 2.4 million people have taken refuge. “Hamas is still holding our captives in Gaza,” Hagari said of the roughly 130 people, including 34 presumed dead, who Israel says remain in the hands of Palestinian groups since the attack. “We also have captives in Rafah, and we will do everything we can to bring them back home,” the military spokesman told a briefing.
The army said it was calling up “two reserve brigades for operational activities”, about a week after withdrawing most ground troops from Gaza.
The Gaza government media office said Israeli aircraft and tanks launched “dozens” of strikes overnight on central Gaza, reporting several casualties.
Witnesses said that strikes hit the Nuseirat refugee camp, with clashes also reported in other areas of central and northern Gaza.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 33,729 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the territory’s health ministry.
More than six months of war have led to dire humanitarian conditions in the besieged Gaza Strip. Rumours of a reopened Israeli checkpoint on the coastal road from the territory’s south to Gaza City sent thousands of Palestinians heading north on Sunday, despite Israel denying it was open. Attempting the journey back to northern Gaza, displaced resident Basma Salman said, “even if it (my house) was destroyed, I want to go there. I couldn’t stay in the south.”
“It’s overcrowded. We couldn’t even take a fresh breath of air there. It was completely terrible.”
In Khan Yunis, southern Gaza’s main city, civil defence teams said they had retrieved at least 18 bodies from under the rubble of destroyed buildings.
Responding late on Saturday to the latest truce plan presented by US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators, Hamas said it insists on “a permanent ceasefire” and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza. Israel’s Mossad spy agency called this a “rejection” of the proposal, accusing Palestinian groups of “continuing to exploit the tension”. But the United States said mediation efforts continue.