Israeli forces resumed ground and air attacks on the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, while in the southern part of the besieged enclave, tanks and troops crossed a highway leading to Rafah, where some 1.5 million displaced Palestinians are taking refuge.
Israel previously announced it had withdrawn its troops from the largely devastated north, where famine has gripped the region, after claiming it had defeated Hamas months ago.
But on Monday, its forces and tanks returned to northern Gaza and resumed shelling in Jabalia, where Hamas said its fighters were engaged in fighting.
Israel has described its latest return north as part of a so-called “cleansing” phase of the war, but Palestinians say the need to return is proof that Israel’s military objectives are unattainable.
Hamas’ armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, said its fighters were engaged in armed combat with Israeli forces east of Jabalia and east of Rafah in southern Gaza.
In a series of statements on its Telegram channel, the Qassam Brigades said one of its snipers had shot dead an Israeli soldier in Jabalia. The group said its fighters “targeted” an Israeli army bulldozer with an Al-Yassin 105 shell, east of Jabalia.
Earlier on Monday, the group said its fighters attacked a crowd of Israeli soldiers with mortar shells inside the Jabalia camp, the largest refugee camp in northern Gaza.
In Rafah, brigade fighters also attacked an “infiltration” of Israeli soldiers inside the vital border crossing with Egypt, it said. The armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) said its fighters fired mortars at Israeli forces massed on the Palestinian side of the crossing.
Israeli forces seized the Palestinian side of the crossing last week and blocked the entry of humanitarian aid and essential supplies to desperate Palestinians in the enclave.
As the heaviest fighting in weeks unfolds in both north and south Gaza, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have again fled, and aid groups warn that an already dire humanitarian crisis could worsen. worsen considerably.
The attacks come as health officials in Gaza warn that the few remaining health facilities are on the brink of total collapse.
“Terrible” situation
Residents fled their homes along rubble-strewn streets in Jabalia, carrying bags full of their belongings. Tank shells were falling in the center of the camp and air raids had destroyed groups of houses, they said.
“We don’t know where to go. We have been moved from one place to another… We are running in the streets. I saw it with my own eyes. I saw the tank and the bulldozer. It’s on this street,” said a woman who did not give her name.
More than 35,000 people, mostly women and children, have been killed in Israel’s war on Gaza since October, according to Palestinian health authorities. The assault ravaged the coastal enclave and caused a deep humanitarian crisis, with Gaza’s health ministry warning in a statement on Monday that the medical system was on the verge of collapse due to a shortage of fuel for power generators and ambulances.
Israel launched its war on Gaza after Hamas carried out an attack on southern Israel on October 7, killing at least 1,130 people, mostly civilians, according to an Tel Aviv Tribune tally based on Israeli statistics. .
Palestinian health officials said they had found 20 bodies of Palestinians killed in overnight air raids on Jabalia, which injured dozens more.
In Rafah, Israel intensified its aerial and ground bombardment of eastern areas of the city, killing people in an air raid on a house in the Brazil neighborhood.
Israel ordered residents to evacuate the east of the city last week and extended the order to central areas in recent days, sending hundreds of thousands of people, most of whom are already displaced, fleeing to new shelters.
Residents said Israeli air and ground bombardment was intensifying and tanks had cut off the main north-south Salah al-Din Street that separates the eastern part of the city from the central area.
“Tanks have cut off Salah al-Din Street in the east of the city, forces are now in the southeast, concentrating near the built-up area, the situation is terrible and the sounds of explosions do not stop never,” Bassam, 57, said. , from the Shaboura district in Rafah.
“People continue to leave Rafah… no place seems safe now and people do not want to escape at the last minute in case of sudden tank incursions and it would be too late to leave,” he said. he told the Reuters news agency.
UNRWA, the main United Nations aid agency in Gaza, estimates that around 360,000 people have fled the southern city since the Israeli army issued its first evacuation order a week ago.
The assault on Rafah sparked one of the biggest divisions in generations between Israel and its main ally, the United States, which suspended some arms deliveries for the first time since the assault began. Washington has said Israel should not attack Rafah without a plan in place to protect civilians, something it has yet to see.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s office said Monday that he had briefed U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the “specific operation” in the Rafah region.
Jack Lew, the US ambassador to Israel, signaled Sunday that the Rafah incursion was still on a scale that Washington considers acceptable.