Israeli forces and drones opened fire toward hundreds of people waiting for aid trucks in central Gaza early Tuesday, killing at least 25 people, Palestinian witnesses and hospitals said.
Israeli forces have begun to tear down a home in the Palestinian town of Hizma, near Jerusalem, according to the Jerusalem governorate.
Footage shared by the governorate and verified by Al Jazeera shows an Israeli bulldozer tearing into the home’s walls. The governorate says the owner received no prior warning.
The Awda hospital in the urban Nuseirat refugee camp, which received the victims, said the Palestinians were waiting for the trucks on the Salah al-Din Road south of Wadi Gaza.
During a raid in Shu’fat Camp near Jerusalem early this morning, Israeli forces fired shots that hit a 66-year-old woman in the head, killing her, according to the Wafa news agency.
Wafa named the woman as Zahia Judah al-Obaidi.
“It was a massacre,” said Ahmed Halawa. He said tanks and drones fired at people, “even as we were fleeing. Many people were either martyred or wounded”.
Hossam Abu Shahada, another eyewitness, said drones were flying over the area, watching the crowds first, then there was gunfire from tanks and drones as people were moving eastward. He described a “chaotic and bloody” scene as people were attempting to escape.
He said he saw at least three people lying on the ground motionless and many others wounded as he fled the site.
The Awda hospital said another 146 Palestinians were wounded. Among them were 62 in critical condition, who were transferred to other hospitals in central Gaza, it said.
In the central town of Deir al-Balah, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital said it received the bodies of six people who were killed in the same incident.
Palestinian witnesses and health officials say Israeli forces have repeatedly opened fire on crowds seeking desperately needed food, killing hundreds of people in recent weeks. The military says it has fired warning shots at people it said approached its forces in a suspicious manner.
Explosive kills 7 Israeli soldiers in Gaza inside an armored vehicle, military says
Seven Israeli soldiers were killed Tuesday in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis when their armored vehicle was struck by an explosive, an Israeli military official said Wednesday.
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in line with military regulations, said six of the soldiers’ names had been cleared for publication, while one was still being kept confidential.
It was a particularly deadly incident for Israel's military inside Gaza. Over 860 Israeli soldiers have been killed since the the war began with the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack — including more than 400 during the fighting inside Gaza.
Also in the area of Khan Younis area, one soldier was seriously wounded Tuesday by weapons fire, the military said.
Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s military wing, said on its Telegram channel it had ambushed Israeli soldiers taking cover inside a residential building in southern Gaza Strip.
Some of the soldiers were killed and other injured after they were targeted by a Yassin 105 missile and another missile south Khan Younis, Hamas said. Al-Qassam fighters then targeted the building with machine guns.
It was not immediately clear whether the two incidents were the same.
The deadly attack came as the Palestinian death toll inside Gaza crossed the 56,000 mark.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said Tuesday that Israel’s 21-month military operation in Gaza has killed 56,077 people.
Hamas in its 2023 attack on southern Israel killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 others hostage. Many hostages have been released by ceasefire or other agreements.
The death toll is by far the highest in any round of Israeli-Palestinian fighting. The ministry doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants but says more than half of the dead were women and children.
The ministry said the dead include 5,759 who have been killed since Israel resumed fighting on March 18, shattering a two-month ceasefire.
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