The death toll
\nfrom escalating violence in Gaza had risen to 24 on Sunday, including six
\nchildren, as Israel extended its bombardment of Palestinian militants who
\nhave retaliated with a barrage of rockets.<\/p>\n
The updated count from health authorities in the Hamas Islamist-run territory
\nsaid six children were among those killed since the start of the “Israeli
\naggression” on Friday, in addition to 204 people injured.<\/p>\n
But Israel said it had “irrefutable” evidence that a stray rocket from
\nIslamic Jihad militants had been responsible for the death of multiple
\nchildren in Jabalia, northern Gaza, on Saturday.<\/p>\n
It was not immediately clear how many children were killed in the incident in
\nJabalia. An AFP photographer saw six dead bodies at an area hospital,
\nincluding three minors.<\/p>\n
Israel’s military has warned its aerial and artillery campaign against
\nIslamic Jihad could last a week, but Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi
\nsaid Cairo is talking “around the clock” with both sides to ease the
\nviolence.<\/p>\n
Israel has said it was necessary to launch a “pre-emptive” operation against
\nIslamic Jihad, as the group was planning an imminent attack following days of
\ntensions along the border with Gaza.<\/p>\n
Civilians meanwhile took refuge in air raid shelters on the Israeli side,
\nwith AFP journalists hearing sirens warning of incoming fire in the Tel Aviv
\narea on Saturday evening.<\/p>\n
In Rafah, on Gaza’s border with Egypt, women and children were trapped under
\nrubble following an Israeli strike, the strip’s civil defence unit said.<\/p>\n
Rescue workers were digging through the site where a top Islamic Jihad
\ncommander, Khaled Mansour, was reportedly targeted by an Israeli strike on
\nSaturday.<\/p>\n
There was no specific confirmation of Mansour’s death, but the head of the
\nIsraeli army’s operations directorate, Oded Basiok, said in a statement that
\nthe entire “senior leadership of the military wing of the Islamic Jihad in
\nGaza has been neutralised”.<\/p>\n
Daily life in the strip has come to a standstill, while the electricity
\ndistributor said the sole power station shut down due to a lack of fuel after
\nIsrael closed its border crossings.<\/p>\n
Gaza’s health ministry said the next few hours will be “crucial and
\ndifficult”, warning it risked suspending vital services within 72 hours as a
\nresult of the lack of electricity.<\/p>\n
– ‘We are all alone’ –<\/p>\n
In Gaza City, resident Dounia Ismail said Palestinians have become accustomed
\nto preparing a “survival bag” of items such as money and medicine.<\/p>\n
“This latest escalation brings back images of fear, anxiety, and the feeling
\nthat we are all alone,” she told AFP.<\/p>\n
On the Israeli side of the frontier, the Magen David Adom emergency service
\nsaid two people were hospitalised with shrapnel wounds and 13 others were
\nlightly hurt while running for safety.<\/p>\n
In Kibbutz Nahal Oz, an Israeli community beside the Gaza border, resident
\nNadav Peretz said he has been “in the bomb shelter or around it” since
\nFriday.<\/p>\n
“We recognise that on the other side too there is an uninvolved civilian
\npopulation, and on both sides children deserve to enjoy their summer
\nvacation,” the 40-year-old said.<\/p>\n
– Five-year-old girl –<\/p>\n
Islamic Jihad is aligned with Hamas, but often acts independently. Both are
\nblacklisted as terrorist organisations by much of the West.<\/p>\n
Hamas has fought four wars with Israel since seizing control of Gaza in 2007,
\nincluding the conflict last May.<\/p>\n
A flare-up with Islamic Jihad came in 2019, following Israel’s killing of
\nBaha Abu al-Ata, Jabari’s predecessor. Hamas did not join the fray in that
\nconflict.<\/p>\n
Hamas’s moves now could prove crucial, with the group facing pressure from
\nsome to restore calm in order to improve economic conditions in Gaza.<\/p>\n
The UN humanitarian chief for the occupied Palestinian territories, Lynn
\nHastings, urged the warring sides to allow “fuel, food, and medical supplies”
\nto be delivered to Gaza amid the worsening crisis.<\/p>\n
On Friday, the health ministry reported “a five-year-old girl” was among
\nthose killed by Israeli fire.<\/p>\n
The girl, Alaa Kaddum, had a pink bow in her hair and a wound on her
\nforehead, as her body was carried by her father at her funeral.<\/p>\n
The Gaza strikes follow the arrest in the occupied West Bank of two senior
\nmembers of Islamic Jihad, including Bassem al-Saadi, whom Israel accuses of
\norchestrating recent attacks.<\/p>\n
Israel on Saturday broadened its operation against Islamic Jihad, announcing
\nthe arrest of 19 people in the West Bank it said were members of the group.<\/p>\n
Israel has conducted a wave of often deadly raids in the West Bank since mid-
\nMarch in response to lethal attacks on Israelis.BSS\/AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The death toll from escalating violence in Gaza had risen to 24 on Sunday, including six children, as Israel extended its bombardment of Palestinian militants who have retaliated with a barrage of rockets. The updated count from health authorities in the Hamas Islamist-run territory said six children were among those killed since the start of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-4","category-14"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29532"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29532\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29534,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29532\/revisions\/29534"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/29533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deshnews24.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}