Agencies
Gaza
At least 22 people, including women and children, have been killed in an Israeli attack on the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza as Israeli forces press on with their ground assault in the area.
As the death toll mounted on Saturday, the Israeli military issued evacuation orders for northern Gaza with instructions for residents near Jabalia to evacuate to the south of the enclave.
The Israel military launched a deadly offensive in the Jabalia area a week ago which it claims is aimed at stopping Palestinian group Hamas from regrouping. The attacks have trapped thousands of Palestinian civilians, international charity Doctors Without Borders, known by its French initials MSF, said.
Hamas on Saturday slammed the Israeli army and said its “massacres are a continuation of the ongoing criminal genocide against our people, shielded by American support”.
Palestinian news agency Wafa reported on Saturday that Israeli fighter jets bombed a multistorey apartment block in Jabalia on Friday night, hitting four inhabited homes and killing 22 people.
The attack that wounded more than 90 people was an attempt to “punish the population for their resilience and rejection of displacement”, the group said in a statement.
At least 30 people were injured, and 14 people remain missing and are believed to be buried under the rubble, according to Wafa.
Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said that “powerful explosions were heard in the northern part of the Gaza Strip”, adding that many of the casualties were “arriving at the hospital either in pieces or soaked in blood”.
The Kamal Adwan Hospital in the north was perilously close to running out of fuel and staff said Israeli soldiers had ordered them to leave.
Reporting from the facility, Al Jazeera’s Moath al-Kahlout described the weeklong siege as “suffocating”.
The situation is “dire”, he reported, as the hospital has also been ordered by the Israeli military to cease operations. But he said it continues to treat patients ranging from those severely injured to newborns.
Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, said its fighters hit a group of 15 Israeli soldiers with an explosive device while they were trying to storm a house in the west of the Jabalia camp.
In a statement on the Telegram messaging app it said some soldiers were killed and others wounded, but didn’t provide further information.
The World Food Programme (WFP) warned on Saturday that the escalating violence in northern Gaza was “having a disastrous impact on food security for thousands of Palestinian families”.
No food aid has entered since October 1, the United Nations agency said, noting that the main crossings into the north have been closed.
Food distribution points, kitchens and bakeries have been forced to shut down because of air strikes, military ground operations and evacuation orders, it said.
“The north is basically cut off and we’re not able to operate there,” said Antoine Renard, WFP country director for Palestine, adding that “safe and sustained access, it is virtually impossible to reach the people in need”. WFP said its last remaining supplies in the north have been distributed to shelters, health facilities and kitchens in Gaza City and three shelters.
“If the conflict continues to escalate at the current scale, it is unclear how long these limited food supplies will last and the consequences for fleeing families will be dire.” In Gaza City, at least three people were killed and several more injured after a separate strike hit a home in the Tuffah neighbourhood, according to Palestine Red Crescent Society paramedics.
Ibrahim Abu Rish, a member of the Palestinian Civil Defence in Gaza, told Al Jazeera that its teams were still engaged in rescue operations and were looking for a missing girl, after taking more than 15 injured people to hospital.
The Israeli military posted a map of northern Gaza on social media platform X on Saturday with instructions for residents in the vicinity of Jabalia to leave.
“The area must be evacuated immediately via [Salah al-Din Street] to the humanitarian area,” the post said, referring to so-called Israeli-designated humanitarian safe zones between al-Mawasi and Deir el-Balah.
The “humanitarian area”, already populated by overcrowded tent camps housing about one million displaced Palestinians, has been repeatedly attacked by the Israeli military.
But Palestinians, especially those in the northern parts of the enclave, are refusing to leave their homes, said Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary, reporting from Deir el-Balah.
“This is not the first ground operation of the Israeli army in Jabalia. Palestinians say they prefer dying in their homes because they believe that there is no place safe across the Gaza Strip, so even if they evacuate they might get killed on the way,” she reported.
Amid the evacuation order, MSF project coordinator Sarah Vuylsteke wrote on X that “nobody is allowed to get in or out” from within Jabalia itself, adding that “anyone who tries is getting shot”.
Earlier, MSF criticised Israel’s efforts to “forcefully and violently push thousands of people from northern Gaza to the south”.
Much of Gaza has been laid to waste since Israel launched its war on the Palestinian territory in the wake of the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023.
Gaza’s Ministry of Health said on Saturday that at least 42,175 people have been killed and 98,336 wounded in Israeli attacks since October 2023.
The toll includes 49 dead and 219 injured in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry.
