Israel steps up deadly attacks as it pushes ahead with campaign to seize Gaza City and push out 1 million people.
Israeli forces have killed at least 77 Palestinians across Gaza, including 47 people in northern Gaza City, as the military intensifies its campaign to seize the city and displace about one million people living there.
The killings on Saturday included 11 Palestinians who were shot dead while queueing for food aid, and came as the Ministry of Health in Gaza announced that 10 more people had died of malnutrition in the last 24-hour period.
The victims included three children.
In Gaza City, Israeli forces launched three strikes in quick succession, tearing apart an apartment block and killing at least seven people. Several more were wounded, including children.
media’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Gaza City, said the attack caused “mayhem and chaos” and damaged the surrounding areas.
“Many children were wounded. They arrived to the hospital fully soaked in their own blood. We saw one child transferred to the hospital who had the flesh of others who were wounded sticking to his back.”
Families fleeing the Israeli military’s relentless bombardment have begun setting up makeshift tents amid miserable conditions near Nuseirat refugee camp and near Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.
Most of them have been forced to leave their homes more than once.
Mohamed Maalouf, 50, told The Associated Press news agency that he and his family of nine had already been displaced from the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya.
“We are thrown in the streets, like what would I say? Like dogs? We are not like dogs. Dogs are [treated] better than us,” he said.
“We have no homes. We are on the streets,” he added.
‘We are on the streets’
Heavy Israeli strikes also targeted Jabalia in northern Gaza, forcing people there to flee, too.
Mohammed Abu Warda told media that he had fled Jabalia and was heading towards the western side of Gaza City, but that he did not know exactly where to go.
Israeli forces have carried out a sustained bombardment on Gaza City since early August as part of a deepening push to seize the city and displace about one million Palestinians living there.
On Friday, the Israeli military said it had begun the “initial stages” of its offensive, declaring the largest urban centre in the territory a “combat zone”.
The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Mirjana Spoljaric Egger, condemned Israel’s offensive, saying its order for trapped civilians to evacuate saying the mass evacuation of the city was “unfeasible and incomprehensible”.
“It is impossible that a mass evacuation of Gaza City could ever be done in a way that is safe and dignified under the current conditions,” Egger said in a statement.
“Such an evacuation would trigger a massive population movement that no area in the Gaza Strip can absorb, given the widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure and the extreme shortages of food, water, shelter and medical care.”
Despite the growing global condemnation, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has shown no signs of halting the military offensive.
Gideon Levy, a columnist with Israeli news outlet Haaretz, told media that Israel’s overarching plan for Gaza amounts to ethnic cleansing.
“The plan is to push all the inhabitants of Gaza out of their houses, then lock them in those concentration camps and then give them two choices, either to live in those camps forever or to leave the Gaza Strip,” Levy said.
Describing the Israeli government’s policy as “outrageous”, Levy added that Israel will only halt its offensive if United States President Donald Trump decides that “enough is enough” and applies pressure on the country.
The US has provided Israel with billions of dollars in military assistance since its war on Gaza began in October 2023. Washington has also shielded its top ally from calls for accountability at the United Nations and other international arenas.
In February, Trump suggested removing all Palestinians from Gaza, a plan that would amount to ethnic cleansing, a crime against humanity.
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