Israeli forces detain Palestinian men as hundreds of civilians flee besieged Beit Lahiya
Israeli forces separated Palestinian women and children from men when hundreds of civilians fled the war-torn and besieged northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya on Wednesday, The Associated Press (AP) news agency reports.
Many of those fleeing Beit Lahiya, which has been under an Israeli military siege for more than 50 days, crowded onto donkey carts with their belongings in their arms. Others walked on foot, some holding the hands of their small children, as they approached Israeli forces who had encircled the town and prevented food, water and medicine from entering.
“We left, and here we are sitting, with no shelter or food, and we do not know where to go,” Umm Saleh al-Adham, a woman who fled Beit Lahiya, told the AP news agency She said Israeli troops separated the Palestinian men and only allowed the women and children to travel onward to Gaza City.
The Israeli military said it facilitated the evacuation of thousands of civilians from Beit Lahiya and also detained dozens of Palestinians who were taken to Israel for questioning, the AP reports.
Palestinian child among 2 killed in northern Gaza
Wafa reports that a child has been killed in Israeli shelling of his family home in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City. Another Palestinian was also killed in Israeli shelling in the Jabalia refugee camp, Wafa’s correspondent said.
Earlier, we reported that four people were killed in Israeli attacks on two homes in Beit Lahiya, also in the north of the Gaza Strip.
Israel fighter jets carry out intense bombing of Gaza
This started in the early hours of this morning across the Gaza Strip. We can confidently say that the entire Gaza Strip has been bombed equally since the early hours of this morning. We can still clearly hear the sound of the fighter jets flying at a very, very low level across the central area of Gaza and Deir el-Balah city.
Reports were received from the northern part of the Strip, particularly from Jabalia and the city of Beit Lahiya. These fighter jets carried out deadly attacks that destroyed the remaining residential buildings in Jabalia refugee camp, Jabalia town as well as the northern part of Beit Lahiya Project area and Beit Lahiya city.
This is just pushing people into further internal displacement and causing massive civilian casualties.
In the Nuseirat refugee camp, particularly in the northern area of the camp, very close to the Netzarim junction, the Israeli military on the ground is conducting a policy to expand the junction. In doing so, it carries out these attacks to destroy remaining residential buildings.
These buildings are residential homes and residential towers that the Israeli military claims are being used as observation points by Palestinian fighters. But from what we’ve heard from witnesses, there were massive numbers of civilians inside these residential buildings.
Israeli drone attack kills four in Gaza’s Khan Younis
The Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that four people were killed early on Thursday when drones targeted a group of Palestinian civilians near a camp for displaced people in the town of Abasan, located to the east of Khan Younis. A number of other people were also injured in the drone strike, Wafa reports.
Residential buildings were also attacked and destroyed east of Rafah city in the south of the territory and in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza, according to Wafa’s sources in the war-torn enclave.
Nine killed in Israeli attack on Nuseirat
Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reports that they were killed when the Israeli army bombed a residential building in the northern area of Nuseirat, in the central part of the Strip.
Footage posted online and verified by Al Jazeera’s fact-checking agency Sanad, documents the moment a building in the Nuseirat camp in the central Gaza Strip was bombed.
One killed, Al Jazeera cameraman injured in latest Israeli attack on Gaza’s Nuseirat
Within the past few minutes, we received a confirmed report of another attack on the Nuseirat refugee camp. The attack injured our colleague, the cameraman for Al Jazeera Mubasher, and another person passing was killed by flying shrapnel.
In the past couple of hours, an intense bombing campaign coupled with heavy artillery has been targeting not only residential buildings and homes, but also mosques and other public facilities.
One of these attacks was on a residential home that was full of displaced people, including a displaced family from Gaza City. Seven members of that family were killed right away, and others are still missing and trapped under the rubble.
Attacks are also continuing in Beit Lahiya, an area that is accommodating the majority of people who were displaced from Jabalia refugee camp and Jaballa town, in the almost 56 days of military siege of the northern part of the Strip.
Another attack on Gaza City, in an area between Khan Younis city and Rafah killed four people. A combination of the continuing bombings and the worsening weather conditions are creating a recipe for deepening suffering for already displaced, traumatised populations across the Gaza Strip.
Essay Pro