Israel stepped up its bombardment in and around Khan Younis, Gaza’s second-largest city, as ambulances and private cars rushed to a local hospital transporting the wounded from this new phase of the enclave’s war.
Under pressure from the United States to avoid further mass casualties, Israel says it is being more precise by expanding its offensive in southern Gaza after wiping out much of the north. Aerial bombardments and the ground offensive have already driven three quarters of the territory’s 2.3 million inhabitants from their homes.
At Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, ambulances transported dozens of injured people throughout the night and into the early hours of Tuesday. At one point, a car stopped and a man appeared, carrying a young boy in a bloody shirt whose hand had been torn off.
Israel ordered residents to leave nearly two dozen neighborhoods instead of the entire region, as it did in the north. But with most of Gaza’s population already concentrated in the south, crowding into U.N. shelters and houses, there are few places left to go. Israel has barred people who fled the north at the start of the war from returning.
Palestinians say that as Israel continues its attacks across the besieged territory, there are no areas where they feel safe, and many fear that if they leave their homes they will never be allowed to return there. to come back.
