Israeli attacks killed at least 26 Palestinians, including children, in Gaza on New Year’s Day, as makeshift shelters for displaced people across the Strip were flooded after days of heavy rain.
The attacks were reported on Wednesday in Jabalia in northern Gaza, the Bureij refugee camp in Gaza City in central Gaza, and the southern town of Khan Younis.
Gaza’s health ministry said four children and a woman were among the dead. At least 10 other Palestinians were missing and believed to be under the rubble.
“Fifteen people were martyred and more than 20 injured in a massacre after midnight in a house where displaced people lived in the town of Jabalia,” said Gaza Civil Defense Agency spokesman Mahmoud Basal.
A relative of some of the victims said first responders were still searching for survivors. “The house has become a pile of debris,” Jibri Abu Warda said.
“It was a massacre with body parts of children and women scattered everywhere. They were sleeping when the house was bombed,” Abu Warda said. “No one knows why they targeted the house. They were all civilians.
An overnight attack in the Bureij refugee camp killed a woman and a child, according to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, which received the bodies.
In the Shujaiya neighborhood of Gaza, a strike on a residential house belonging to the al-Suweirki family killed six people, including two children and a woman, civil defense said in a statement.
Another strike in Khan Younis left three people dead, according to the Nasser hospital and the European hospital which received the bodies.
The civil protection agency said it was struggling to respond to distress calls from families due to intense Israeli bombardment in recent days.
“People under siege in the incursion areas are suffering from a total lack of livelihoods. The suspension of our services has completely affected the lives of citizens exposed to Israeli bombing,” a member of the civil defense told Tel Aviv Tribune.
“The new year comes to Gaza, not with joy or hope, but with the sound of fighter jets, drones and the sounds of breathtaking explosions,” said Tareq Abu Azzoum of Tel Aviv Tribune, in a reporting from Deir el-Balah, in central Gaza.
The Israeli war on Gaza has killed at least 45,553 Palestinians and injured 108,379 since October 7, 2023, the Gaza Health Ministry announced on Wednesday.
“It is not only Israeli bombs and forced displacement that burden Palestinians, but also the intense cold. Many of them live in tents, without warm winter clothing, and try to cope with all this by resorting to rudimentary means of heating,” Abu Azzoum said.
Days of heavy rain have flooded hundreds of makeshift shelters across the enclave, adding more misery to forcibly displaced Palestinians as Israel continues to restrict the entry of humanitarian aid. At least six infants have died of cold in recent days.
“For three days, we have not slept for fear that our children will get sick due to the winter, as well as for fear that missiles will fall on us,” said Samah Darabieh, a displaced woman from Deir el- Balah, in central Gaza, and now lives in Beit Lahiya.
Throughout their 15-month offensive against Gaza, Israeli forces regularly besieged and attacked medical facilities housing both patients and displaced families.
“Two days ago they bombed Al-Wafaa hospital, which is behind us, and the shrapnel fell here,” Darabieh said.
Last week, Israeli forces attacked Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, forcibly evacuating medical staff and patients from the facility and arresting the hospital’s director, Dr. Hussam Abu Safia, who remains unknown. where the hospital director is located.
Kamal Adwan Hospital “is suffering from a suffocating siege, as the operating and surgical departments, laboratory, maintenance, ambulances and warehouses were completely burned down,” Gaza’s health ministry said.
The United Nations has said Israeli attacks on Gaza’s hospitals have pushed its health system “to the brink of total collapse”, and that Israeli justifications for Palestinian armed groups using health facilities are “vague, broad” and “contradicted by publicly available information”.
Israel’s continued attack on Gaza has drawn growing international condemnation, with officials and rights groups calling the attacks and blocking of aid deliveries acts of genocide.
In November, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide case before the International Court of Justice over its deadly war on Gaza.
