GAZA: Hamas’s government media office said at least 210 Palestinian people were killed in Israeli attacks on Saturday on a central Gaza refugee camp from which four hostages were rescued.
“The number of victims from the Israeli occupation’s massacre in the Nuseirat camp has risen to 210 martyrs and over 400 injured,” the press office said in a statement.
Earlier today, the Israeli army announced the rescue of four Israeli hostages in Nuseirat in an operation.
The army named the rescued hostages as Almog Meir Jan, 22, Noa Argamani, 26, Andrey Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 41.
The Palestinian movement Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh vowed to keep fighting after the Israeli attack on the refugee camp.
“Our people will not surrender, and the resistance will continue to defend our rights in the face of this criminal enemy,” Haniyeh said in a statement.
The Hamas government had in an earlier statement reported 94 Palestinians killed in and around Nuseirat, adding that they had been taken to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital in Deir al-Balah.
It said the hospital was “unable to accommodate the number of martyrs and injured”, appealing to the international community and aid organizations for help.
The rare rescue comes eight months into the ongoing Israeli bombardment in Gaza.
Since October 7 last year, Israel has launched relentless bombardments and ground offensive on Gaza killing more than 36,801 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to the territory’s health ministry.
A Gaza hospital said Israeli strikes in central areas of the territory, including in Nuseirat camp, killed at least 15 Palestinian people on Saturday.
“Intense Israeli air strikes in central governorate left at least 15 martyrs and tens injured who have been brought to Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital,” the spokesman for the facility, doctor Khalil al-Dakran, told AFP.
Dakran said the casualties had come from in and around Nuseirat camp as well as Deir al-Balah, where the hospital is located.
Hamas said in a separate statement: “There are dozens of bodies of martyrs and wounded lying on the ground, in the streets, and in safe rooms.”
The Palestinian group added that Israeli forces were engaged in a “brutal and savage aggression on Nuseirat camp”.
In recent weeks, the Israeli military has carried out intense air and ground assaults in and around Nuseirat.
On Thursday, the military struck a school-turned-shelter run by the UN agency for supporting Palestinian refugees, also known as UNRWA, which the Al-Aqsa hospital said had killed 37 Palestinian people.
The Israeli military acknowledged it conducted the strike in the Nuseirat refugee camp that targeted the UN school.
