Israel said on Thursday it attacked dozens of targets, leaving Palestinians struggling to survive in what the United Nations called an “apocalyptic” situation.
Gazans are seeking refuge in neighbouring Rafah on the border with Egypt, relying on Israeli leaflets and reports that they will be safe in the city. But they remain fearful after an Israeli strike on a house there killed 15 people on Wednesday, Rafah health officials said.
Israel said Thursday it had killed several militants in southern Gaza’s largest city, Khan Younis, including two militants who emerged from a tunnel, a day after Israeli troops entered the city centre. Hamas’s armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, earlier said the fighting was fierce.
The Gaza Health Ministry said an Israeli airstrike overnight killed four people in a house in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, while another strike killed two people in Khan Younis on Thursday morning.
Residents of Gaza City in the north reported overnight bombardments and fierce gunfire in Shejaiya, east of the centre, and Jabaliya refugee camp further north, as well as bombardments in another area, Sabra.
Israel said it raided a Hamas camp in Jabaliya, killing several militants and uncovering a network of tunnels, a training base and a weapons cache. In Khan Younis, Israeli troops surrounded the home of Hamas leader Yahya al-Sinwar, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday night. He said in a video statement:
“His home may not be his castle, and he can escape, but it’s only a matter of time before we get him.”
Residents of Khan Younis reported that Israeli tanks approached Sinwar’s home. Israel said it believed many Hamas leaders and fighters were hiding in underground tunnels.
Israeli warplanes also bombed targets across the densely populated coastal strip in one of the heaviest phases of the two-month war. WAFA, the official Palestinian news agency, reported on Wednesday that at least 17 people were killed in an Israeli airstrike on a house in Maghazi in central Gaza.
Qatar’s Al Jazeera Media Network reported that an Israeli bombardment of Jabaliya camp in northern Gaza killed 22 relatives of its correspondent in Gaza, Moamen al-Sharafi.
The UN humanitarian office said on Wednesday that most homeless people in Rafah, 13 kilometres (8 miles) south of Khan Younis, were sleeping on the streets because of a shortage of tents, although the UN has managed to distribute several hundred.
In Gaza, more than 200,000 people have fled their homes, the UN said, the most since a 2014 air and ground offensive by Israel uprooted about 400,000. The vast majority are sheltering in schools run by the UN agency for Palestinian refugees. Damage to three water and sanitation sites have cut off services to 400,000 people, the UN said.
