At least 24 killed, 54 injured in Israeli strikes in Gaza, testing ceasefire, officials say
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- Israeli airstrikes Saturday killed at least 24 Palestinians and wounded 54 in Gaza, health officials in the territory say.
- The strikes tested the six-week-old ceasefire days after the U.N. Security Council approved a U.S. blueprint for Gaza governance and potential Palestinian statehood.
DEIR AL BALAH, Gaza Strip — Israel’s military on Saturday launched airstrikes in the Gaza Strip that killed at least 24 people and wounded 54, including children, health officials there say, in the latest test of the six-week-old ceasefire.
The Israeli strikes, which Israel said were in response to gunfire at its troops and which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said killed five senior Hamas members, came as international momentum was building over Gaza, with the United Nations Security Council on Monday approving the U.S. blueprint to secure and govern the territory. It authorizes an international stabilization force to provide security, approves a transitional authority to be overseen by President Trump and envisions a possible future path to an independent Palestinian state.
Israel has previously carried out similar waves of strikes after reported attacks on its forces. At least 33 Palestinians were killed over a 12-hour period Wednesday and Thursday, mostly women and children, health officials said.
One of Saturday’s strikes targeted a vehicle, killing 11 and wounding more than 20 Palestinians in Gaza City’s Rimal neighborhood, said Rami Mhanna, managing director of Shifa Hospital, where the casualties were taken. Most of the wounded were children, director Mohamed Abu Selmiya said.
Associated Press video showed children and others inspecting the blackened vehicle, whose top was blown off.
A strike targeting a house near Al Awda Hospital in central Gaza killed at least three people and wounded 11 others, according to the hospital. It said a strike on a house in Nuseirat camp in central Gaza killed at least seven people, including a child, and wounded 16 others.
Another strike, targeting a house in Deir al Balah in central Gaza killed three people, including a woman, according to Al Aqsa Hospital.
“Suddenly, I heard a powerful explosion. I looked outside and saw smoke covering the entire area. I couldn’t see a thing. I covered my ears and started shouting to the others in the tent to run,” said Khalil Abu Hatab in Deir al Balah. “When I looked again, I realized the upper floor of my neighbor’s house was gone.”
He added: “It’s a fragile ceasefire. This is not a life we can live. There’s no safe place.”
Israel’s military in a statement said it launched attacks against Hamas after an “armed terrorist” crossed into an Israeli-held area and shot at troops in southern Gaza. It said no soldiers were hurt. The military said the person had used a road on which humanitarian aid enters the territory, and called it an “extreme violation” of the ceasefire, which began Oct 10.
In other statements, the military said soldiers killed 11 “terrorists” in the Rafah area and detained six others who tried to flee an underground structure. It also said its forces killed two others who crossed into Israeli-held areas in northern Gaza and advanced toward soldiers.
Israeli forces remain in just over half of Gaza after withdrawing from some areas under the ceasefire.
A senior member of Hamas’ political bureau, Izzat al-Rishq, in a statement accused Israel of “fabricating pretexts to evade the [ceasefire] agreement and return to the war of extermination.” He added that Hamas had urged the U.S. and other mediators to compel Israel to implement the agreement.
The Hamas statement didn’t comment on the claim by Netanyahu’s office of five senior members killed.
The war began with the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, that killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostage. Almost all of the hostages or their remains have been returned in ceasefires or other deals.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says 69,733 Palestinians have been killed and 170,863 injured in Israel’s retaliatory offensive. The toll has gone up during the ceasefire both from new Israeli strikes and from the recovery and identification of bodies of people killed earlier in the war.
The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its figures but has said women and children make up a majority of those killed. The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals, maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by independent experts.
Shurafa writes for the Associated Press.
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