Israeli airstrikes in Gaza on Saturday killed at least 18 Palestinians, according to medical professionals, while the Israeli military claimed that the strikes targeted gunmen operating from shelters and aid storage facilities.
In Deir Al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, where people gathered to receive aid, an airstrike near the municipality building killed at least ten people, according to medics.
Medics reported that victims were being transported from the attack scene to the hospital via private vehicles, rickshaws, and foot. The head of the central Gaza Hamas-run administrative committee was killed in the strike, according to a Hamas source.
The Israeli military was investigating the report, according to a spokesperson. The military reported earlier that Israeli planes had hit militants and weapon caches close to an aid warehouse, where gunmen had fired rockets into Israel.
Hamas fighters were targeted in a separate attack in Gaza City on a former shelter for displaced people, according to the military. According to Palestinian medical officials, the attack claimed the lives of at least seven people, including a mother and child.
Uncertainty surrounded whether the other victims were combatants. To lower the risk of harm to civilians, the military claimed to have taken preventative measures.
Physicians reported that a local journalist was killed in a separate strike in Gaza City. The military was investigating the report, according to a spokesperson.
On October 7, 2023, the Palestinian militant group Hamas invaded Israel, killing 1,200 people, primarily civilians, and capturing over 250 hostages, which Israeli authorities say led to the start of the war in Gaza.
Israel then began an air, sea, and land offensive that has left much of the enclave in ruins, displaced almost all of the population, and killed at least 44,000 people, primarily civilians, according to authorities in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.
Recent weeks have seen a renewed push for a truce between the United States, Qatar, and Egypt.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi spoke with U.S. officials who were in the country on Saturday about efforts to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and an agreement to exchange hostages for prisoners in the Palestinian enclave, according to Sisi’s office.
