Destruction in Gaza caused by Israel's ongoing offensive, on January 17, 2024. (AFP)
Gaza Strip: An Israeli airstrike on a home killed 16 people, half of them children, in the southern Gaza town of Rafah, medics said early yesterday. The Israeli military continued to strike targets in areas of the besieged territory where it has told civilians to seek refuge.
The health ministry in Gaza said yesterday that at least 24,620 people have been killed in Israeli strikes. A ministry statement said 61,830 people have also been wounded in the Palestinian territory since October 7, 2023.
More than 100 days into the war, Israel continues to wage one of the deadliest and most destructive military campaigns in recent history. The war has stoked tensions across the region, threatening to ignite other conflicts.
More than 24,000 Palestinians have been killed, some 85% of the narrow coastal territory’s 2.3 million people have fled their homes, and the United Nations says a quarter of the population is starving.
Hundreds of thousands have heeded Israeli evacuation orders and packed into southern Gaza, where shelters run by the United Nations are overflowing and massive tent camps have gone up. But Israel has continued to strike what it says are militant targets in all parts of Gaza, often killing women and children.
Dr. Talat Barhoum at Rafah’s El Najjar Hospital confirmed the death toll from the strike in Rafah and said dozens more were wounded. Associated Press footage from the hospital showed relatives weeping over the bodies of loved ones.
“They were suffering from hunger, they were dying from hunger, and now they have also been hit,” said Mahmoud Qassim, a relative of some of those who were killed.
Internet and mobile services in Gaza have been down for five days, the longest of several outages during the war, according to internet access advocacy group NetBlocks. The outages complicate rescue efforts and make it difficult to obtain information about the latest strikes and casualties.
The Israeli military said it fired an interceptor at a “suspicious aerial target” — likely a drone or —- approaching over the Red Sea yesterday, triggering air raid sirens in the southern Israeli coastal city of Eilat. Yemen's Houthi rebels have launched drones and missiles toward Israel that mostly fell short or were intercepted and shot down.
Hamas has continued to fight back across Gaza, even in the most devastated areas, and launch rockets into Israel. It says it will not release any more hostages until there is a permanent cease-fire.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says many other dead and wounded are trapped under rubble or unreachable because of the fighting. The ministry says around two-thirds of those killed were women and children.
Israel says 193 of its soldiers have been killed since the Gaza ground offensive began.
