44 killed in Israeli strikes across Gaza
Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli attacks killed 44 people yesterday, including 23 in an attack on a home in the centre of the Palestinian territory.
“Forty-four people have been killed in Israeli raids on the Gaza Strip,” civil defence official Mohammad Al-Mughayyir told AFP.
“Twenty-three people were killed, others injured and several (are) missing following an Israeli strike on the Qreinawi family’s home east of Al-Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza.”
Mughayyir also reported “two people killed and several injured by Israeli forces’ gunfire this morning near the American aid centre in the Morag axis, southern Gaza Strip.”
When asked by AFP about the strike in Al-Bureij and the gunfire near the aid centre, the Israeli military said it was looking into them.
Meanwhile, Israel announced the creation of 22 new settlements in the occupied West Bank, risking further strain on relations with the international community.
“This is a blatant defiance of the international will and a grave violation of international law and United Nations resolutions,” Hamas said a statement.
In the Gaza Strip, a United Nations warehouse was broken into by “hordes of hungry people” on Wednesday as aid trickles into the Palestinian enclave on the brink of famine and the United States readies new terms for a possible truce between Israel and Hamas.
The World Food Programme said initial reports were that two people had died and several more were injured at the central Gaza warehouse. The UN agency appealed for an immediate scale-up of food aid “to reassure people that they will not starve.”
Eyewitness video independently verified by Reuters shows large crowds of people pushing into the warehouse and removing bags and boxes as gunfire can be heard. It was not immediately clear how the people may have been killed or injured in the incident.
Under growing international pressure, Israel ended an 11-week long aid blockade on Gaza 10 days ago. It has allowed a limited amount of relief to be delivered via two avenues – the United Nations or the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
UN Middle East envoy Sigrid Kaag told the Security Council that the amount of aid Israel had so far allowed the UN to deliver was “comparable to a lifeboat after the ship has sunk” when everyone in Gaza was facing the risk of famine.
The United States has been trying to broker a ceasefire. “We are on the precipice of sending out a new term sheet that hopefully will be delivered later on today,” US President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said on Wednesday. “The president is going to review it,” Witkoff added.
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