Palestinian health officials say Israeli strikes have killed at least 16 people in the Gaza Strip.
The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital received the bodies, including the remains of a woman and three children, after strikes overnight and into Thursday. An media reporter at the hospital counted the bodies.
A man held the body of a child wrapped in a white shroud as a woman next to him wept, saying: “My love, my soul.”
The Israeli offensive launched in response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack has killed over 40,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to the local Health Ministry, which does not say how many were militants or civilians.
Hamas and other militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in the Oct. 7 attack and abducted around 250. Around 110 hostages are still inside Gaza, a third of whom are believed to be dead.
The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 fighters, without providing evidence. It blames civilian deaths on Hamas because the militants fight in dense, residential areas.
The United States, Qatar and Egypt have spent months trying to broker a cease-fire deal and hostage release but major gaps remain.
Here’s the latest:
UNITED NATIONS — Successive Israeli evacuation orders in Gaza, including 12 just this month, have displaced 90% of its 2.1 million residents since the Israel-Hamas war began last October, often multiple times, the top U.N. humanitarian official for the Palestinian territory says.
Muhannad Hadi said the evacuation orders are endangering civilians instead of protecting them. “They are forcing families to flee again, often under fire and with the few belongings they can carry with them, into an ever-shrinking area” that is crowded and unsafe.
Civilians are being deprived of medical care, shelter, water wells and humanitarian supplies, “running from one destroyed place to another, with no end in sight,” he said.
Hadi said in the statement Thursday that international humanitarian law requires the protection of civilians. “The way forward is as clear as it is urgent: protect civilians, release the hostages, facilitate humanitarian access, agree on a cease-fire.”
The evacuations are also the latest threat to U.N. personnel working in Gaza and affects humanitarian facilities, according to U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric, who cited as an example that the U.N. World Food Program lost access to its warehouse in central Deir al-Balah.
“This was the third and last operational warehouse in Gaza’s middle area,” Dujarric said. “Five community kitchens operated by WFP have also been evacuated, as the agency seeks new locations for them.”
UNITED NATIONS — Palestinians say they plan to introduce a U.N. General Assembly resolution in September enshrining the recent sweeping ruling by the U.N.’s top court that declared Israel’s presence in the occupied Palestinian territories unlawful – and setting a time frame for it to end.
Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian U.N. ambassador, told the U.N. Security Council on Thursday that the resolution, which will not be legally binding, is essential to spur the end of Israel’s occupation.
“We are sick and tired of waiting,” he said. “The time for waiting is over.”
Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon, who spoke to the council after Mansour, made no mention of the Palestinians’ plan. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quickly denounced the nonbinding opinion by the ICJ’s 15 judges, saying the territories are part of the Jewish people’s historic homeland.
Mansour did not disclose the time frame the Palestinians are planning to include in the General Assembly resolution.
He said the resolution will be “a significant step” toward a two-state solution, where independent states of Israel and Palestine live side-by-side in peace.
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