Many more killed in overnight strikes on Gaza
- Last updated: December 31, 2023 | 13:20
Israelis and Palestinians end a dark year on Sunday, with no end in sight to the deadliest military offensive on Gaza. On Sunday the ministry reported numerous deaths in overnight strikes on central Gaza's Zawayda and the nearby Al-Mughazi refugee camp. There has been no respite from Israel's air raids, artillery fire or ground fighting with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, to the despair of Palestinians surviving the onslaught.
"We were hoping that 2024 would arrive under better auspices and that we would be able to celebrate the new year at home with our families," said Mahmoud Abou Shahma in a camp for displaced people in Rafah, on the Egyptian border. "We hope that the war will end and that we will be able to return to our homes and live in peace", said the 33-year-old from Khan Yunis, an epicentre of the conflict in the south of Gaza. Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry says the Israeli military campaign has killed at least 21,672 people, mostly women and children –by far the heaviest death toll of any Israeli operation.
The Israeli army says 170 soldiers have been killed in combat inside Gaza. An Israeli siege imposed after October 7, following years of crippling blockade, has led to dire shortages of food, safe water, fuel and medicine in Gaza, with aid convoys able to offer only sporadic relief. The UN says more than 85 per cent of Gaza's 2.4 million people have fled their homes.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has warned of the growing threat of infectious diseases and the UN says Gaza is "just weeks away" from famine. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday that Israel's war against Hamas will last for "many months" – until the Palestinian group has been eliminated. "We will guarantee that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel," he told a news conference.
'Every shred of hope'
As Netanyahu spoke, more than a thousand relatives and supporters of the hostages demonstrated in Tel Aviv to maintain pressure on his government to bring their loved ones home. "I hope there's going to be another deal, even a partial deal or some will be released. I'm trying to hold on to every shred of hope," said Nir Shafran, 45.
In Khan Yunis, medics at Nasser hospital described severe shortages. "The hospital is receiving a lot more (patients) than its capacity," doctor Ahmad Abu Mustafa said in footage shared by the WHO. "The beds are full... and we are basically short on all sorts of medicine supplies." The fighting has put 23 hospitals and 53 health centres out of service, while 104 ambulances have been destroyed, the health ministry said. In Zawayda, Palestinians pulled the body of a child from under the rubble on Saturday after an Israeli strike.
"We pulled (out) nine martyrs, who were members of a very peaceful family. Two adjacent houses were targeted," said the area's civil defence director, Rami al-Aidi. The Gaza war has intensified tensions across the region. Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels have repeatedly targeted vessels in the vital Red Sea shipping lane with strikes they say are in support of Palestinians in Gaza.
On Saturday, the US military said one of its destroyers shot down two anti-ship ballistic missiles fired from territory controlled by the rebels. The US Central Command described it as the "23rd illegal attack by the Houthis on international shipping" since November 19. CENTCOM said the destroyer had also responded to a call for help from a Danish container ship that was hit in a separate strike. Israel has also traded frequent cross-border fire with Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah movement.
"If Hezbollah wants to extend the war, it will be dealt blows like never before, and so will Iran," Netanyahu warned on Saturday. In Syria, at least 23 pro-Iran fighters – five Syrians, four Hezbollah members, six Iraqis and eight Iranians – were killed on Saturday in raids "likely" carried out by Israel, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Agence France-Presse