Written by Nidal Al-Maghribi
CAIRO (Reuters) – Residents said that Israeli forces expanded the scope of their raid on northern Gaza, and tanks reached the northern edge of Gaza City, bombing some neighborhoods of the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood and forcing many families to leave their homes.
Residents said that Israeli forces effectively isolated Beit Hanoun, Jabalia, and Beit Lahia in the far north of the Strip from Gaza City, and prevented access between the two areas except after obtaining permission for families wishing to respond to evacuation orders and leave the three towns.
Nine days after the major Israeli operation in northern Gaza, the media office of the Hamas-run Gaza government said that Israeli raids had killed about 300 Palestinians there. She said that Israel’s bombing of civilian homes and displaced persons’ shelters was aimed at forcing residents to leave Gaza permanently, which Israel denies.
The Ministry of Health in Gaza says that dozens have been confirmed killed in attacks on the northern regions, and it is feared that dozens more may have died on the roads and under the rubble of homes out of the reach of medical teams.
Later on Sunday, an Israeli tank bombardment killed at least 22 Palestinians in a school housing displaced families in the Nuseirat camp in the central Gaza Strip, according to what medics reported.
The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said at least 15 children and women were among those killed at the school. She added that 80 other people were injured.
Hours earlier, an Israeli air strike killed five children in the Beach refugee camp in Gaza City. The official Palestinian news agency, Wafa, and Hamas-affiliated media said that the children were playing near a café when they were killed by a missile fired by an Israeli drone.
The Israeli army did not immediately comment on the two reports.
“What is happening in northern Gaza is terrifying beyond words,” Acting UN Humanitarian Aid Coordinator Joyce Msuya said in a post on the social media platform X.
She added: “Attacks launched by Israeli forces are increasing. Hospitals are forced to evacuate their patients. Basic supplies are running out. People have been forcibly displaced, cut off from aid, and left to starve. The atrocities must end.”
While the main attack is in the north, Israel is also bombing other areas across the Gaza Strip. The Ministry of Health reported that at least 34 people had been killed so far on Sunday.
Many Jabalia residents posted on social media: “We will not leave, we will die, and we will not leave.”
The northern part of Gaza, which is inhabited by more than half of the Strip’s population of 2.3 million, was bombed in the first phase of the Israeli attack on the Strip a year ago, after the October 7 attacks on Israeli towns by militants that killed 1,200 people. 250 hostages were captured.
After a year of Israeli attacks that killed 42,000 Palestinians, hundreds of thousands of residents returned to the devastated northern regions. Israel returned its forces more than a week ago to eliminate the fighters, who it said were regrouping to launch more attacks. Hamas denies that its fighters work among civilians.
The escalation in northern Gaza occurred simultaneously with a massive Israeli air attack and a ground campaign on a separate front in southern Lebanon against Hezbollah, which like Hamas is considered an ally of Iran.
Nasser, a resident of Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, said, “While the world focuses on Lebanon and the possible Israeli strike against Iran, Israel is wiping out Jabalia.”
He told Reuters via a chat application, “The occupation is blowing up roads and destroying residential neighborhoods. People also cannot find anything to eat and are trapped inside their homes for fear of bombs falling on their heads.”
The Israeli army said in a statement on Sunday that forces operating across the Gaza Strip during the past 24 hours attacked about 40 targets and killed dozens of activists.
He added, “The forces of the 162nd Division continue their work in the Jabalia area, and on the last day, the forces killed dozens of terrorists and found explosives, weapons, hand grenades, and other means of warfare in the area.”
The armed wings of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other smaller factions said their fighters attacked Israeli forces in Jabalia and nearby areas with anti-tank missiles and mortar shells.
Palestinian and United Nations officials say there are no safe areas in Gaza. They also expressed concern about severe shortages of food, fuel and medical supplies in northern Gaza, and said there was a risk of famine there.
Residents said that some tank shells fell in some streets of the Sheikh Radwan suburb of Gaza City, where the tanks reached the outskirts of the area, which led to spreading panic among residents in the south.
In the southern Gaza Strip, the Israeli authorities released 12 Palestinians they arrested during the ground attack, according to local officials on the border. The released detainees complained of torture and ill-treatment during their detention in Israel, which Israel denies.
(Reporting and writing by Nidal Al-Mughrabi, Editing by Peter Graff and Chris Rees)
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