Deadly Israeli strikes on ‘apocalyptic’ north Gaza

GAZA: Israel on Saturday again carried out deadly air strikes on north Gaza, where the UN calls conditions “apocalyptic”, as Lebanon’s Hezbollah intensified rocket fire near Israel’s commercial hub of Tel Aviv, on Israel’s second front.

Since late September Israel has been engaged in full-scale war against Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon while fighting continues against the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which triggered the Gaza war by attacking Israel on October 7 last year.

The war has threatened to spiral even further after Israel and Iran attacked each other over the past few months. Iran’s supreme leader vowed on Saturday a further response to attacks against the Islamic republic and its allies.

Since October 6 Israeli forces have carried out a major air and ground assault on north Gaza, centred on the Jabalia area, vowing to stop attempts by Hamas militants from regrouping. “The situation unfolding in north Gaza is apocalyptic,” said a joint statement by UN agency heads.

“The area has been under siege for almost a month, denied basic aid and life-saving supplies while bombardment and other attacks continue,” the heads of the humanitarian, health and other agencies said.

“The entire Palestinian population in North Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine and violence.” Witnesses said Israeli warplanes twice hit Beit Lahia, adjacent to Jabalia, overnight. Israel’s military on Saturday said dozens of militants were killed around Jabalia “in aerial and ground activity.” Troops were also operating in central Gaza and Rafah in the territory’s far south, it added, while witnesses said Israeli drones and boats opened fire on Al-Mawasi in south Gaza.

Medics and Gaza’s civil defence rescuers on Saturday reported three people killed in a strike on Nuseirat, in central Gaza, a day after AFP images showed the blood-stained shrouds of several people killed there in an Israeli strike.

After nearly a year of tit-for-tat exchanges over Israel’s northern border, which Hezbollah said were in support of Hamas, Israel on September 23 escalated its bombing campaign against targets in Lebanon and later sent in ground troops.

Hezbollah has since fired more deeply into Israel.

A strike in Israel’s Sharon area north of Tel Aviv wounded 19 people, police said early Saturday, after the army reported three projectiles fired from Lebanon into central Israel.

Four of the wounded were “in moderate condition”, the Israeli police said. Hezbollah said it had again launched rockets at Israel’s Glilot intelligence base near Tel Aviv.

AFP images from Tira, a predominantly Arab town about 25 kilometres (15 miles) northeast of Tel Aviv, showed the upper wall blown out in what appeared to be a residential building. Several cars below were crushed.

Israel’s military said a strike around the southern Lebanese city of Tyre on Friday killed two fighters “responsible for firing over 400 projectiles at Israel over the last month alone”.

Late Friday, Lebanon’s health ministry said 52 people had been killed in Israeli strikes in the country’s east, attacks for which the Israeli army had not issued evacuation warnings. Since the war escalated Israeli strikes have killed at least 1,911 people in Lebanon, according to an AFP tally of health ministry figures.

Israel’s military says 37 soldiers have been killed in Lebanon since it began ground operations on September 30.