Deadly Israeli strike hits house sheltering displaced people in Gaza

Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip have killed at least 33 people, including one attack on a home where displaced people were sheltering in the isolated north that killed 19, Palestinian health chiefs said.

The Israel-Hamas war has raged on with no end in sight, even after Israel reached a ceasefire deal with Lebanon’s Hezbollah and international attention shifted to the overthrow of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Both the outgoing and incoming US administrations have said they hope to end the war before the inauguration of Donald Trump in January, but months of ceasefire talks have repeatedly stalled.

The strike that killed 19 occurred in the northern town of Beit Lahiya near the border with Israel, according to the nearby Kamal Adwan Hospital, which received the bodies.

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Hospital records show that a family of eight were among those killed, including four children, their parents and two grandparents.

The hospital said another strike near its entrance on Wednesday killed a woman and her two children.

Another strike in the built-up Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza killed at least seven people, according to the Awda Hospital.

The dead included two children, their parents and three relatives.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. The military has said it tries to avoid harming civilians and accuses militants of hiding among them, putting their lives in danger.

Militants in central Gaza fired four projectiles into Israel on Wednesday, two of which were intercepted, the military said. The other two fell in open areas, and there were no reports of casualties.

The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into Israel on October 7 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250 people, including children and older adults.

Around 100 hostages are still unaccounted for inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 44,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to local health officials. They say women and children make up more than half the dead but do not distinguish between fighters and civilians in their count. Israel says it has killed more than 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.

Thousands more Palestinians have gone missing during the war, some after encounters with Israeli troops.

Israel has been waging a renewed offensive against Hamas in Gaza’s isolated and heavily destroyed north since early October. Troops have surrounded Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun and the urban Jabaliya refugee camp, allowing in almost no humanitarian aid and ordering tens of thousands to flee to nearby Gaza City.

Israeli officials have said the three communities are mostly deserted, but the United Nations humanitarian office said it believes around 65,000 to 75,000 people are still there, with little access to food, water, electricity or health care.

Experts have warned that the north may be experiencing famine.

Humanitarian aid to the north has largely been blocked for the past 66 days, the UN added.

Sigrid Kaag, the senior UN humanitarian and reconstruction coordinator for Gaza, told reporters on Tuesday that civilians trying to survive all across Gaza face an “utterly devastating situation”.

She pointed to the breakdown in law and order and looting that has left the UN and many aid organisations unable to deliver food and other humanitarian essentials to hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in need.

Ms Kaag said she and other UN officials keep repeatedly asking Israel for access for convoys to northern Gaza and elsewhere, to allow in commercial goods, to reopen the Rafah crossing from Egypt in the south, and to approve dual-use items.

The Israeli military says it allows in enough humanitarian aid and blames UN agencies for not distributing it, saying large amounts of aid have accumulated just inside Gaza’s borders.

UN officials say Israeli restrictions, the breakdown of law and order and ongoing fighting make it difficult to access the aid and distribute it, and have repeatedly called for a ceasefire.

The United States, Egypt and Qatar have been mediating talks between Israel and Hamas for nearly a year, and diplomats say those efforts have recently gained momentum.

But Hamas has said it will not release the remaining hostages without an end to the war and a full withdrawal of Israeli troops.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pledged to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed and all the hostages are returned, and has said Israel will maintain a lasting military presence in some areas.

In Lebanon, where near-daily Israeli attacks have continued despite the ceasefire, at least five people died Wednesday in Israeli strikes in the south, according to Lebanon’s health ministry and state news agency.

Elsewhere in southern Lebanon, Israeli forces withdrew from a strategic town and handed it back to the Lebanese army in co-ordination with UN peacekeepers, the two militaries said. It appeared to be the first Israeli pull-out from a Lebanese border town captured during the ground invasion.

In Syria, the Israeli military estimates it has destroyed 70% to 80% of Syrian military assets in recent days, according to an official speaking on condition of anonymity. The military has said it has carried out hundreds of airstrikes.