Israeli forces stepped up air strikes in the Gaza Strip on Thursday (8), killing at least 40 people, Palestinian medics said, in yet another battle against Hamas-led militants as Israel prepares for a possible wider war in the region.
Israeli air strikes hit a cluster of homes in the central Gaza al-Bureij camp, killing at least 15 people, and the nearby al-Nuseirat camp, killing four, medics said. Nuseirat and Bureij are among eight historic camps in the densely populated enclave and are seen by Israel as strongholds of armed militants.
Israeli aircraft also bombed a house in the heart of Gaza City to the north, killing five Palestinians, while another airstrike in the southern town of Khan Younis killed one person and wounded others, medics said.
Later on Thursday, 15 Palestinians were killed and 30 wounded in Israeli shelling of two schools east of Gaza City, the territory’s Civil Emergency Service said in a statement.
The Israeli military said it struck Hamas command and control centers housed in the Abdel-Fattah Hamouda and Al-Zahra schools in the Tuffah neighborhood of Gaza City, where Hamas militants were operating.
They accused Hamas of exploiting civilians and civilian property for military purposes, an allegation Hamas denies.
Images circulating on social media, which Reuters could not immediately verify, showed victims being taken to hospital on donkey carts.
The armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad said they were firing anti-tank rockets and mortar shells at Israeli forces operating in Gaza, causing deaths and injuries among them.
The Israeli military said it had struck dozens of military targets in Gaza in the past 24 hours, including rocket launch pads.
Hamas-led militants triggered the Gaza war on Oct. 7 last year with a cross-border attack on Israeli communities, killing 1,200 Israelis and foreigners and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli records.
Since then, at least 39,699 Palestinians have been killed, including 22 in the past 24 hours, and 91,722 have been wounded in Israel’s devastating air and ground war in Gaza, the Gaza Health Ministry said in an update on Thursday.
The ministry in the Hamas-run territory makes no distinction between fighters and civilians in its death lists.
As the Gaza war continues, Israel has been bracing for another attack expected in the coming days, following promises by Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah to retaliate for last week’s assassinations of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hezbollah military commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut.
Source: CNN Brasil
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