At least 20,000 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip since Israel began bombing the enclave more than ten weeks ago, according to Palestinian officials.
At least 8,000 children and 6,200 women were among those killed, the Gaza government media office said Wednesday.
The grim milestone came when the United Nations Security Council postponed for the third time a key vote on an attempt to increase humanitarian aid to Gaza to avoid a veto by the United States, which traditionally protects their ally Israel in UN action.
Since the breakdown of a seven-day truce on December 1, the war has entered a more intense phase, with ground fighting previously limited to the northern half of the territory now extending across its entire length.
Asked about the ever-increasing number of casualties, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said it was “clear that the conflict will evolve and must move to a phase of lower intensity.”
“We expect and want to see a transition to more targeted (Israeli) operations with a smaller number of forces and that really focus on the leadership of Hamas, the tunnel network and a few other critical things,” he said. he declares. “And as that happens, I think you will also see harm to civilians decline significantly.”
Airstrikes continued across Gaza on Wednesday, killing at least 46 people and injuring dozens in Israeli attacks on the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry. .
In Rafah, in the south of the Gaza Strip, where hundreds of thousands of people have been pushed back since early December by Israel’s incessant attacks, airstrikes hit a building near a hospital near a team from Tel Aviv Tribune live, killing at least 10 people.
“More airstrikes are being carried out, more casualties are falling due to the expansion of Israeli military operations in areas supposed to be safe zones where the majority of Gazans have been asked to flee,” said Tareq Abu Azzoum of ‘Tel Aviv Tribune in a report from Rafah.
“The airstrike took place in an area considered very densely populated, and it is a miracle that there were not more casualties than this number,” he added.
Key Security Council vote postponed
The UN Security Council’s vote on a proposal to increase aid to the Gaza Strip and asking the UN to monitor humanitarian aid deliveries to the region has been delayed at the request of the United States. United, diplomats said.
According to the UAE’s envoy to the UN, Lana Nusseibeh, the vote will take place on Thursday.
“Everyone wants to see a resolution that has impact and is applicable on the ground, and discussions are ongoing on how to make that possible,” Nusseibeh, whose country drafted the resolution, told reporters at New York.
The text aims to dilute Israel’s control over all humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza’s 2.3 million residents. The original text was reportedly amended to soften calls to end the fighting in Gaza to avoid another US veto.
“We want to make sure that the resolution… doesn’t do anything that would actually harm the delivery of humanitarian aid, make it more complicated. That’s what we’re focused on,” Blinken told reporters Wednesday. “I hope we can get to a good place.”
Currently, Israel is monitoring limited deliveries of humanitarian aid and fuel to Gaza through the Rafah crossing from Egypt and the Israeli-controlled Karem Abu Salem crossing, known as Kerem Shalom in Hebrew.
On Wednesday, the first aid convoy entered Gaza directly from Jordan with 750 tons of food. The World Food Program said half of Gaza’s population is starving and only 10 percent of the food needed has entered Gaza since the war began on October 7.
The United States and Israel oppose a ceasefire, saying it would only benefit Hamas. Washington instead supports pauses in fighting to protect civilians and allow the release of prisoners captured by Hamas.
Hamas leader makes rare visit to Egypt
Separately, on Wednesday, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh made his first visit to Egypt in more than a month in a rare personal intervention in diplomacy, in hopes that the Palestinian group and Israel could hear about the terms of another truce.
Haniyeh arrived in the Egyptian capital to meet with Cairo’s intelligence chief and other Egyptian officials who act as key mediators. Meanwhile, Israeli officials have indicated in discussions with U.S. and Qatari representatives that they may be open to a truce.
The Hamas leader last visited Egypt in early November before the announcement of the only break in fighting so far, a week-long truce that saw the release of around 110 of 240 captives taken by Hamas to Gaza on October 7.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a small armed group that also holds prisoners in Gaza, said its leader would also travel to Egypt in the coming days to discuss a possible end to the war.
A source briefed on the negotiations said the envoys were discussing which prisoners still held by Palestinian groups could be released under a new truce and which prisoners Israel could release in exchange, the Reuters news agency reported .
But there remains a huge gap between the two sides’ publicly stated positions on a possible end to the fighting. Hamas rejects any further temporary pause and says it will only discuss a permanent ceasefire. Israel has ruled out this possibility and says it will only accept limited humanitarian pauses until Hamas is defeated.
US President Joe Biden said he did not expect a deal between Israel and Hamas for the release of captives held in Gaza to be reached soon.
“We’re pushing,” Biden told reporters during a trip to Milwaukee, Wisconsin.