Gaza rescuers say 14 killed in Israeli strikes

PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES: Gaza’s civil defence agency said today that Israeli air strikes killed at least 14 Palestinians overnight, including women and children, while the Israeli military said it had eliminated dozens of rebels in the territory’s north.

An air strike hit tents housing displaced Palestinians in the southern area of Khan Younis, killing at least nine people, including children and women, civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.

The Palestinian Red Crescent also confirmed the toll, saying 11 others were wounded in the strike and were taken to Nasser Hospital.

A second air strike killed five people, including children, and injured about 22 when “Israeli warplanes hit Fahad Al-Sabah school”, which had been turned into a shelter for “thousands of displaced people” in the Al-Tuffah district of Gaza City, Bassal said.

The dead and injured were taken to Al-Ahli Arab Hospital, he added.

In recent months, the military has struck several schools-turned-shelters where Israel has said Palestinian rebels are operating.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military said its troops killed “dozens of terrorists” in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza, where it has been conducting a sweeping air and ground operation for more than a month to prevent Hamas from regrouping.

Israeli forces also killed several insurgents in the area of Rafah in the territory’s south, the military added.

The military is currently engaged in a two-front war, with troops fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.

“Over the past day, the IAF (air force) struck over 50 terror targets in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip,” the military said in a statement.

“Among the targets struck were military structures, weapons storage facilities and launchers,” it added.

Israel’s war in Gaza broke out after Hamas gunmen attacked Israel on Oct 7 last year, which resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people on Israeli side, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures, which included those who died and were killed in captivity.

During the attack, gunmen abducted 251 people, 97 of whom are still held captive in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel’s retaliatory military offensive in Gaza has killed at least 43,508 people, a majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers to be reliable.