CAIRO: The Israeli military issued new evacuation orders to residents in areas of an eastern Gaza City suburb, setting off a new wave of displacement on Sunday, and a Gaza hospital director was injured in an Israeli drone attack, Palestinian medics said.
The new orders for the Shejaia suburb posted by the Israeli army spokesperson on X on Saturday night were blamed on Palestinian militants firing rockets from that heavily built-up district in the north of the Gaza Strip.
“For your safety, you must evacuate immediately to the south,” the military’s post said. The rocket volley on Saturday was claimed by Hamas’ armed wing, which said it had targeted an Israeli army base over the border.
Footage circulated on social and Palestinian media, which Reuters could not immediately verify, showed residents leaving Shejaia on donkey carts and rickshaws, with others, including children carrying backpacks, walking.
Families living in the targeted areas began fleeing their homes after nightfall on Saturday and into Sunday’s early hours, residents and Palestinian media said — the latest in multiple waves of displacement since the war began 13 months ago.
In central Gaza, health officials said at least 10 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes on the urban camps of Al-Maghazi and Al-Bureij since Saturday night.
Hospital director wounded by gunfire
In north Gaza, where Israeli forces have been operating against regrouping Hamas militants since early last month, health officials said an Israeli drone dropped bombs on Kamal Adwan Hospital, injuring its director Hussam Abu Safiya.
“This will not stop us from completing our humanitarian mission and we will continue to do this job at any cost,” Abu Safiya said in a video statement circulated by the health ministry on Sunday.
“We are being targeted daily. They targeted me a while ago but this will not deter us...,” he said from his hospital bed.
Israeli forces say armed militants use civilian buildings including housing blocks, hospitals and schools for operational cover. Hamas denies this, accusing Israeli forces of indiscriminately targeting populated areas.
Kamal Adwan is one of three hospitals in north Gaza that are barely operational as the health ministry said the Israeli forces have detained and expelled medical staff and prevented emergency medical, food and fuel supplies from reaching them.
In the past few weeks, Israel said it had facilitated the delivery of medical and fuel supplies and the transfer of patients from north Gaza hospitals in collaboration with international agencies such as the World Health Organization.
Residents in three embattled north Gaza towns — Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun — said Israeli forces had blown up hundreds of houses since renewing operations in an area that Israel said months ago had been cleared of militants.
Palestinians say Israel appears determined to depopulate the area permanently to create a buffer zone along the northern edge of Gaza, an accusation Israel denies.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed more than 44,000 people, uprooted nearly all the enclave’s 2.3 million population at least once, according to Gaza officials, while reducing wide swathes of the narrow coastal territory to rubble.
The war erupted in response to a cross-border attack by Hamas-led militants on Oct. 7, 2023 in which gunmen killed around 1,200 people and took more than 250 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
Israeli army orders Gaza City suburb evacuated, spurring new displacement wave
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Israeli army orders Gaza City suburb evacuated, spurring new displacement wave
- Israeli military blames Hamas rocket fire for renewed evacuation directive
- Palestinians say hospitals in north Gaza barely functioning
Israel issues evacuation warning for parts of Gaza
GAZA CITY: The Israeli army issued an evacuation warning on Thursday for 14 neighborhoods of northern Gaza, as it pressed a renewed offensive that has drawn international condemnation.
The warning came hours after the UN said it had collected and begun distributing around 90 truckloads of aid in Gaza, the first such delivery since Israel imposed a total blockade on the territory on March 2.
Under global pressure for an end to the blockade and the violence, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was open to a “temporary ceasefire” in Gaza, but reaffirmed the military aimed to bring the entire territory under its control.
In an Arabic-language statement on Thursday, the military said it was “operating with intense force” in 14 areas in the northern Gaza Strip, accusing “terrorist organizations” of operating there.
The army issued a similar warning for northern Gaza on Wednesday evening in what the army said was a response to rocket fire.
It later announced three more launches from northern Gaza, but said the projectiles had fallen inside the Palestinian territory.
Netanyahu said it was necessary to “avoid a humanitarian crisis in order to preserve our freedom of operational action” in Gaza.
Palestinians have been scrambling for basic supplies, with Israel’s blockade leading to critical food and medicine shortages.
Israel has meanwhile kept up its bombardment, with Gaza’s civil defense agency reporting at least 19 people had been killed in Israeli attacks on Thursday.
Umm Talal Al-Masri, 53, a displaced Palestinian in Gaza City, described the situation as “unbearable.”
“No one is distributing anything to us. Everyone is waiting for aid, but we haven’t received anything,” she said.
“We barely manage to prepare one meal a day.”
UN agencies have said that the amount of aid entering Gaza falls far short of what is required to ease the crisis.
“I am tormented for my children,” said Hossam Abu Aida, another resident of the Gaza Strip.
“For them, I fear hunger and disease more than I do Israeli bombardment,” the 38-year-old added. The army stepped up its offensive at the weekend, vowing to defeat Hamas, whose October 2023 attack on Israel triggered the war.
Israel has faced mounting pressure, including from traditional allies, to halt its expanded offensive and allow aid into Gaza.
EU foreign ministers agreed on Tuesday to review the bloc’s cooperation accord with Israel.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry has said the EU action “reflects a total misunderstanding of the complex reality Israel is facing.”
Sweden said it would press the 27-nation bloc to impose sanctions on Israeli ministers, while Britain suspended free-trade negotiations with Israel and summoned the Israeli ambassador.
There has been a global spike in anti-Semitic attacks since the Hamas attack in 2023, with a gunman shooting dead two Israeli Embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington.
Britain, France, Germany, the US, and other countries around the world all condemned the shooting.
British doctors working in Gaza describe territory as a ‘slaughterhouse’
- ‘There’s no food getting in so people are starving,’ surgeon Tom Potokar says
- World leaders urged to ‘stop talking and do something’
LONDON: British doctors working in Gaza have described the territory as a “slaughterhouse,” where the patients they are treating are severely malnourished.
Plastic surgeons and orthopedic specialists from the UK are based at the Amal and Nasser hospitals in Khan Younis in the south of the territory.
Dr. Tom Potokar, a plastic surgeon specializing in burn injuries, has worked in Gaza 16 times but said this mission had revealed a level of destruction far greater than his last visit in 2023, Sky News reported.
“What can you say, it’s horrific, it’s a slaughterhouse,” Potokar said after operating on a badly injured Palestinian woman whose husband and children were killed in an Israeli attack.
He urged world leaders to “stop talking and do something.”
Potokar moved to Amal hospital last week after the nearby European hospital where he had been working was hit by Israeli missiles and forced to close.
Gaza’s health care is in a state of collapse, with hospitals being repeatedly targeted by Israel since the war started in October 2023.
The relentless airstrikes and bombings have killed more than 53,000 people and hospitals are full of Palestinians with blast-related injuries.
A blockade of humanitarian aid since March has further strained hospitals, leaving doctors with limited supplies to treat the injured.
“The difference this time I think is the intensity,” Potokar said. “Back in October to December 2023 was the last time I was here, there was a lot of wounded and it was very intense as well.
“I think the difference this time is, because of the blockade there’s so little stuff getting in, there’s no food getting in so people are starving. There’s very little medical supplies coming in but also the other very noticeable thing is the massive extent of destruction. I mean, Khan Younis looks like Stalingrad.”
The report showed the chaos of the hospital’s emergency rooms, with badly injured children being brought in for initial treatment before being sent for surgery with the British medics.
Most of the injuries are blast wounds and the patients are malnourished.
In Nasser hospital, a baby arrived with chest and back burns, while another lay silent having suffered shrapnel wounds and was unable to see from one eye.
Dr. Victoria Rose, a British plastic surgeon working at the hospital, showed the inside of the burns unit, which was shut down after being hit by Israeli missiles.
Israel this week ordered residents to evacuate Khan Younis, leading to several of the hospital’s staff being unable to get to work, Rose said.
“My anesthetic nurse and Graeme’s orthopedic colleague had to leave us mid-case to go and evacuate their families to an area of safety,” she said.
Dr. Graeme Groom, a surgeon working alongside Rose, praised his Palestinian colleagues.
“These are people just like you and me, they have their homes, their families, they live normal lives. Many are very impressive people and without notice they have to pick up a grab bag and leave, look for food, look for water, look for shelter, but turn up at work each day,” he said.
The surgeons fear that the hospitals may have to be evacuated as Israel expands its military operation in the area as part of a plan to take complete control of the territory.
Israel strikes south Lebanon, army says Hezbollah fighter killed
- The Israeli military said its forces had carried out several strikes targeting Hezbollah sites and killed one militant
- The “urgent warning” was accompanied by a map showing a structure and the 500-meter radius around it marked in red
BEIRUT: Lebanese state media said an Israeli air strike hit a building in southern Lebanon on Thursday after Israel’s military issued an evacuation call warning of imminent action against Hezbollah militants.
Israel has kept up its air strikes in neighboring Lebanon despite a November truce aimed at halting more than a year of hostilities with Hezbollah that included two months of full-blown war.
Without confirming the reported attack on the southern town of Toul, the Israeli military said its forces had carried out several strikes targeting Hezbollah sites and killed one militant.
Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) said that “the Israeli enemy” struck a building in Toul, where the army had warned residents to evacuate the area around a building it said was used by Hezbollah militants.
The “urgent warning” was accompanied by a map showing a structure and the 500-meter (0.3-mile) radius around it marked in red.
“You are located near facilities belonging to the terrorist (group) Hezbollah,” the statement said in Arabic, urging people “to evacuate these buildings immediately and move away from them.”
There were no immediate reports of casualties in Toul.
In a separate statement, the military said it had “struck and eliminated a Hezbollah Radwan Force terrorist in the area of Rab El Thalathine,” about 17 kilometers (10 miles) to the southeast.
The NNA reported a “martyr” in an air strike in the same area, without identifying them.
The Israeli military said its forces also “struck a Hezbollah military site containing rocket launchers and weapons” in the Bekaa Valley as well as “terrorist infrastructure sites and rocket launchers belonging to the Hezbollah terrorist organization... in southern Lebanon.”
A military statement said that “the presence of weapons in the area and Hezbollah activities at the site constitute blatant violations of the understandings between Israel and Lebanon” under the November ceasefire agreement.
Israel will “continue to operate to remove any threat... and will prevent any attempt by Hezbollah to re-establish its terror capabilities,” it said.
Under the ceasefire, Hezbollah fighters were to pull back north of the Litani River and dismantle military infrastructure south of it.
Israel was to withdraw all forces from Lebanon, but it has kept troops in five areas that it deems “strategic.”
The Lebanese army has deployed in the south and has been dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure.
The truce was based on a UN Security Council resolution that says Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers should be the only people to bear arms in south Lebanon, and calls for the disarmament of all non-state groups.
Egyptian president, UK prime minister discuss Gaza ceasefire, humanitarian aid
- Leaders discussed Egyptian, Qatari, and US efforts to enforce ceasefire in the Palestinian coastal enclave
- Abdul Fatah El-Sisi praised ‘positive’ UK position on Gaza, agreed with Sir Keir Starmer on continuing coordination
LONDON: Egyptian President Abdul Fatah El-Sisi praised the UK’s “positive position” on developments in Gaza during a phone call with Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer on Thursday.
The Egyptian Presidency said El-Sisi and Sir Keir discussed strengthening cooperation in the economic, trade, and investment sectors while continuing political consultations on various topics.
Ambassador Mohamed El-Shennawy, the presidential spokesman, said the two leaders discussed the situation in the Gaza Strip and Egyptian, Qatari, and US efforts to enforce a ceasefire in the Palestinian coastal enclave and ensure the flow of humanitarian aid.
The Egyptian president emphasized Cairo’s rejection of displacing Palestinians and expressed support for the Arab-Islamic plan to rebuild Gaza following a ceasefire.
El-Sisi praised the “positive” UK position regarding the situation in Gaza and agreed with the prime minister on continuing coordination to address regional and international developments.
The UK announced on Tuesday that it will stop free-trade negotiations with Israel and has summoned the Israeli ambassador to the Foreign Office in response to Tel Aviv’s expansion of military operations in Gaza.
Settler attacks push Palestinians to abandon West Bank village, residents say
- The West Bank is home to about three million Palestinians
- The Israeli military said it was “looking into” the legality of the outpost at Maghayer Al-Deir
MAGHAYER AL-DEIR, Palestinian Territories: Palestinian residents of Maghayer Al-Deir in the occupied West Bank told AFP on Thursday that they had begun packing their belonging and preparing to leave the village following repeated attacks by Israeli settlers.
Yusef Malihat, a resident of the tiny village east of Ramallah, told AFP his community had decided to leave because its members felt powerless in the face of the settler violence.
“No one provides us with protection at all,” he said, a keffiyeh scarf protecting his head from the sun as he loaded a pickup truck with chain-link fencing previously used to pen up sheep and goats.
“They demolished the houses and threatened us with expulsion and killing,” he said, as a group of settlers looked on from a new outpost a few hundred meters away.
The West Bank is home to about three million Palestinians, but also some 500,000 Israelis living in settlements that are considered illegal under international law.
Settlement outposts, built informally and sometimes overnight, are considered illegal under Israeli law too, although enforcement is relatively rare.
The Israeli military told AFP it was “looking into” the legality of the outpost at Maghayer Al-Deir.
“It’s very sad, what’s happening now... even for an outpost,” said Itamar Greenberg, an Israeli peace activist present at Maghayer Al-Deir on Thursday.
“It’s a new outpost 60 meters from the last house of the community, and on Sunday one settler told me that in one month, the Bedouins will not be here, but it (happened much) more quickly,” he told AFP.
The Palestinian Authority’s Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission denounced Maghayer Al-Deir’s displacement, describing it as being the result of the “terrorism of the settler militias.”
It said in a statement that a similar fate had befallen 29 other Bedouin communities, whose small size and isolation in rural areas make them more vulnerable.
In the area east of Ramallah, where hills slope down toward the Jordan Valley, Maghayer Al-Deir was one of the last remaining communities after the residents of several others were recently displaced.
Its 124 residents will now be dispersed to other nearby areas.
Malihat told AFP some would go to the Christian village of Taybeh just over 10 kilometers (six miles) away, and others to Ramallah.
Uncertain they would be able to return, the families loaded all they could fit in their trucks, including furniture, irrigation pipes and bales of hay.
