DEIR ALBALA, Gaza Strip (AP) – An Israeli attack on a five-story building sheltering displaced Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip killed at least 60 people on Tuesday, more than half of them women and children. According to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
Israel has carried out more airstrikes and larger ground operations in northern Gaza in recent weeks, saying it is focused on eradicating Hamas militants who have reunited in Gaza after more than a year of war. said. But heavy fighting has raised concerns about the deteriorating humanitarian situation for the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who remain in northern Gaza.
Concerns that not enough aid is reaching Gaza continued on Monday, with Israeli lawmakers cutting ties with the main United Nations agency that distributes food, water and medicine, and forcing Israeli lawmakers to cut ties with the main United Nations agency that distributes food, water and medicine from Israeli soil. This was amplified by the passage of two laws prohibiting its distribution. Israel controls access to both Gaza and the occupied West Bank, but it was unclear how the agency, known by the acronym UNRWA, would continue to operate in either location.
“If the humanitarian operation in Gaza is unraveled, it will be a disaster within a series of disasters and should not be considered,” UNRWA spokesman John Fowler said. He said other UN agencies and international organizations distributing aid to Gaza depend on its logistics and thousands of workers.
In Lebanon, the militant group Hezbollah announced on Tuesday that it had chosen Sheikh Naim Qasem to replace its longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike last month. Hezbollah, which has fired rockets at Israel since the start of the war in Gaza, vowed to continue Nasrallah’s policies “until victory is achieved.”
Shortly after, eight Austrian soldiers serving with the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon were reported to have sustained minor injuries in the midday missile attack.
The peacekeeping force, known by the acronym UNIFIL, said the rocket that hit its Lebanese headquarters was “likely” fired by Hezbollah because it came from the north and hit a vehicle factory.
Austrian Defense Minister Claudia Tanner “condemns this attack in the strongest terms and calls on all sides to immediately cease hostilities in the vicinity of the UN mission’s positions,” ministry spokesperson Michael Bauer said on social media. I wrote to Network X.
Strikes occur in northern Gaza as Israel carries out large-scale operations thereThe Gaza Ministry of Health’s emergency services said Tuesday’s strike in the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya killed at least 12 women and 20 children, including infants. According to the initial casualty list provided by emergency services, the dead included a mother and her five children, some of them adults, and a second mother with six children. .
The death toll from the strike was announced by Dr. Marwan Al Hams, head of the field hospital department at the Ministry of Health. A further 17 people were said to be missing.
The nearby Kamal Adwan Hospital was overwhelmed by the wave of injured people from the strike, said Dr. Hossam Abu Safiyah, the hospital’s director. Israeli forces raided medical facilities over the weekend and detained dozens of doctors.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the attack in Beit Lahya.
Israel’s recent operations in northern Gaza have focused on and around Jabaliya refugee camp, leaving hundreds dead and forcing tens of thousands to flee their homes.
Israeli forces have repeatedly raided refugee camps in recent months. It says it has targeted Palestinian militants with precision attacks and strives to avoid harming civilians, but the attacks often result in the deaths of women and children.
Israel announced on Tuesday that four more soldiers had been killed in fighting in northern Gaza, bringing the death toll since the start of the operation to 16, including a colonel. The military claims without evidence that it has killed dozens of militants, but Hamas has not made its losses public.
Hezbollah’s new leader vows to continue fighting Israel
Hezbollah said in a statement that its decision-making Shura Council had selected Qasem, who has been Nasrallah’s deputy leader for more than 30 years, as its new secretary-general.
Mr. Qasem, 71, was a founding member and acting leader of the extremist group established after Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982. He gave several televised speeches, vowing that Hezbollah would continue fighting despite a series of setbacks.
After Hamas’s surprise attack from Gaza sparked a war in Gaza on October 7, 2023, Hezbollah began firing rockets at Israel in retaliation. Iran, which supports both groups, also engaged in a direct firefight with Israel in April, and again this month.
Tensions with Hezbollah boiled over in September, when Israel unleashed heavy airstrikes that killed Nasrallah and most of his senior commanders. Israel launched a ground invasion of Lebanon in early October.
Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets into northern Israel on Tuesday, killing at least one person in the northern city of Ma’arot Tarshiha, authorities said.
Israeli law targeting UN agencies could further restrict aid
UNRWA and other international organizations on Tuesday continued to express anger at the Israeli parliament’s decision to sever ties with the agency.
Israel claims UNRWA has been infiltrated by Hamas and that the extremist group uses UN facilities to siphon aid and protect its operations, but the UN agency denies the claims. There is.
Israeli government spokesman David Mensah said Israel will work with aid groups within the United Nations and other agencies, and vowed that aid would continue to reach Gaza. “By terrorist organizations,” he said.
On Tuesday, multiple United Nations agencies rallied around UNRWA, calling it the “backbone” of the world body’s aid operations in Gaza and other Palestinian territories. UNRWA provides education, medical care and emergency aid to millions of Palestinian refugees from the 1948 war over the creation of Israel and its descendants. Refugee families make up the majority of Gaza’s population.
Nearly a quarter of UNRWA’s approximately 13,000 staff are health workers who provide services such as immunizations, disease surveillance and malnutrition screening, said World Health Organization spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic. . UNRWA’s work was “unmatched by any agency, including the WHO,” he said.
Israel has sharply restricted aid to northern Gaza this month, prompting a warning from the United States that failure to ramp up humanitarian aid could lead to cuts in military aid.
Hamas killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in attacks on Israel last year and took about 250 hostages. There are still about 100 hostages in Gaza, and one-third of them are thought to have died.
More than 43,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli retaliatory attacks, according to local health authorities. Approximately 90% of the country’s 2.3 million people have been forced to flee their homes multiple times.
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Mr. Magdy reported from Cairo and Mr. Mourou from Beirut. Associated Press writers Tia Goldenberg in Tel Aviv, Israel, and Jamie Keaten in Geneva contributed to this report.
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