GAZA: At least 25 Palestinians were killed and 77 others injured in a series of Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, in what appears to be one of the most serious violations of the US-brokered ceasefire that took effect last month.
Medical officials said several of the wounded are in critical condition.
Palestinian authorities and witnesses described a wave of attacks stretching from Gaza City to Khan Younis.
Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Basal said the escalation began with artillery fire on a home in the Shujaiya neighbourhood of Gaza City on Wednesday, killing a young Palestinian. A second strike hit a civilian gathering in the same area, leaving another person dead and dozens wounded.
Basal said Israeli warplanes later bombed the headquarters of Gaza’s Endowments Ministry in the Zeitoun neighbourhood, killing five people, including a pregnant woman and a girl.
In southern Gaza, an Israeli strike on a group of civilians in Khan Younis killed three people and injured several others.
According to Anadolu’s correspondent, many of the targeted locations were areas from which Israeli forces withdrew under the ceasefire agreement that came into force on 10 October. The Israeli army said the strikes were launched in response to gunfire targeting its forces in Rafah.
Hamas condemned the attacks as a “horrific massacre” and a deliberate attempt by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to “resume the genocide”, rejecting Israeli claims of gunfire as an attempt to justify the strikes.
The group called on Türkiye, the US, Egypt, and Qatar — guarantors of the ceasefire — to pressure Israel to halt actions that threaten the fragile truce.
Since October 2023, Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has killed nearly 70,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, injured more than 170,000 people, and left large parts of the enclave in ruins, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
