Casualties reported as Israel bombs Khan Younis
Several Palestinians were wounded at dawn after Israeli forces shelled a house in the town of Abasan al-Kabira, east of Khan Younis, according to local media reports.
Videos of the aftermath of the attack, posted online by the Palestinian Information Center, showed people carrying the wounded, including a bloodied child covered in dust. The attack came as Al-Aqsa TV also reported that Israeli fighter jets were carrying out air attacks on the town of Bani Suheila, also east of Khan Younis.
Earlier, we reported that Israel’s military ordered Palestinians living in more areas of Khan Younis to evacuate ahead of a planned operation there.
Israel issues new evacuation orders for Khan Younis
The Israeli military is ordering civilians in the al-Jalaa neighbourhood of Khan Younis to evacuate, saying there had been “numerous acts of terrorism” in the area.
“The early warning is carried out in order to reduce the damage to the civilian population and keep them away from the combat area,” the military said in a post on X, showing a colour-coded map further adjusting the boundaries of the “humanitarian zone” in southern Gaza.
The notice is the second such order in the past few hours. Earlier, the Israeli military issued an evacuation order for Palestinian civilians in areas south of Khan Younis city centre, including Sheikh Nasser, Barbakh and Maen.
According to the UN, up to 70,000 people have already been forcibly displaced recently as a result of Israel’s evacuation orders for eastern parts of Khan Younis, while more than 86 percent of the Gaza Strip’s land area is currently subject to such notices.
‘We’re running from death to death’: Palestinian in Khan Younis
Tens of thousands of Palestinians have been forced to leave their homes and shelters in the middle of the night in Khan Younis, heading west towards al-Mawasi and north towards Deir el-Balah, already overcrowded with hundreds of thousands of displaced people.
“We’re exhausted. This is the 10th time I and my family have had to leave our shelter,” said Zaki Mohammad, 28, who lives in the Hamad housing project in western Khan Younis, where the occupants of two multistorey buildings were ordered to leave.
“People are carrying their belongings, their children, their hopes and their fears and running towards the unknown, because there is no safe place,” he told Reuters. “We are running from death to death.”
‘Their whole lives in one small bag’: UNRWA chief
Philippe Lazzarini, head of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, says people in Gaza are trapped and have nowhere to go.
In a post on X, he said more than 75,000 people have been displaced in southwest Gaza in the past few days.
“Some are only able to carry their children with them, some carry their whole lives in one small bag,” he added.
Lazzarini also said: “They are going to overcrowded places where shelters are already overflowing with families. They have lost everything and need everything. Unlike in other wars, the people of Gaza are trapped and have nowhere to go.”
