Israeli airstrikes rocked Gaza during a night of heavy bombardment after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Friday it is \u201cexpanding ground operations\u201d in the besieged enclave, where\u00a0communications links have reportedly been severed. <\/p>\n
In a statement Saturday, the IDF said its warplanes hit 150 underground targets in northern Gaza overnight, striking what it called terror tunnels and underground combat spaces and killing several Hamas operatives. <\/p>\n
Among those killed was Asem Abu Rakaba, the man in charge of Hamas\u2019 aerial assets, who had taken part in planning the October 7 attacks on Israel and \u201cdirected the terrorists who infiltrated Israel on paragliders,\u201d the IDF said. <\/p>\n
The IDF is \u201coperating forcefully\u201d on all fronts and will \u201ccontinue striking Gaza City,\u201d IDF spokesperson Rear Adm.\u00a0Daniel Hagari\u00a0said Friday, repeating previous warnings that civilians should evacuate as he announced the intensified ground operation. <\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t know if I (will) live to see the daylight tomorrow morning,\u201d Ammar said. \u201cI split from my wife, and the kids went to her parents\u2019 house, and I came to the hospital here in the event we die in different places and maybe one of us would live and our kids will live. Difficult choices we are making.\u201d <\/p>\n
A substantial ground offensive has been expected ever since the attacks, in which Hamas killed more than 1,400 people and saw some 200 people taken to Gaza as hostages. However, it is not yet clear whether the IDF announcement of an expanded operation signals the start of that push. <\/p>\n
This is the third night of Israeli ground actions in Gaza, as it amasses thousands of troops on the border with the enclave. It comes after weeks of bombardment and blockading Gaza, precipitating what aid agencies call a humanitarian crisis. <\/p>\n
Hamas has vowed to retaliate if Israeli ground troops enter Gaza. Izzat al-Rishq, a senior member of the Hamas political bureau, vowed that Hamas is ready to defeat\u00a0Israeli soldiers\u00a0if they enter the territory. <\/p>\n
Ghazi Hamad, a senior Hamas\u00a0official, told the\u00a0Associated Press on Thursday that Hezbollah and other allies were expected to play a bigger role as the Israel-Hamas war rages. \u201cHezbollah now is working against the occupation,\u201d he said, adding a rare public appeal:\u00a0\u201cWe appreciate this. But \u2026 we need more in order to stop the aggression on Gaza \u2026 We expect more.\u201d <\/p>\n
Concerns have risen that Israel\u2019s army may target Gaza hospitals after it alleged that the enclave\u2019s largest medical center, Al Shifa, is the site of a Hamas command and control center \u2013 a claim that Palestinian authorities in Gaza and Ramallah, as well as doctors at the hospital, have denied. <\/p>\n
Hagari claimed Hamas of directing rocket attacks and commanding Hamas operations from bunkers underneath the hospital building, and appeared to suggest such hospitals could be on Israel\u2019s target list. \u201cWhen medical facilities are used for terror purposes, they are liable to lose their protection from attack in accordance with international law,\u201d Hagari said. <\/p>\n
Mustafa Barghouti of the Palestine National Initiative based in Ramallah said Israel was lying. \u201cThey keep lying to justify criminal acts against a civilian population, now they want to justify attacking people in a hospital\u201d he told Sky News. <\/p>\n
And Mads Gilbert, a Norwegian physician who has worked at the Shifa hospital on several occasions, including during three periods of open hostilities between Hamas and Israel, called the allegations \u201cold.\u201d <\/p>\n
Gaza appears largely cut off from the world, with communications in the enclave badly disrupted by airstrikes, according to Palestinian telecoms company Jawwal. London-based monitoring firm NetBlocks has also reported that the last standing major internet operator in the region, Paltel, has experienced damage to its international routes. <\/p>\n
Palestinian Authority\u00a0Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh accused Israel\u00a0of cutting communications and internet to Gaza on Friday in an \u201cattempt to create darkness so that crimes can be committed\u201d in preparation for an IDF ground operation. <\/p>\n
Several aid organizations and UN agencies say they have now lost contact with local staff in Gaza. <\/p>\n
Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the organization had been unable to communicate with its staff and \u201chealth facilities, health workers and the rest of our humanitarian partners on the ground.\u201d <\/p>\n
Catherine Russell, executive director of UNICEF, said on X, formerly Twitter, that she is \u201cextremely concerned\u201d about her team in Gaza after losing touch with them. \u201cAll humanitarians and the children and families they serve MUST be protected,\u201d Russell added. <\/p>\n
M\u00e9decins Sans Fronti\u00e8res (MSF), also known as Doctors Without Borders, said it had lost contact with some Palestinian colleagues in Gaza, while the International Committee of the Red Cross said it was \u201cdeeply worried\u201d for the safety of its staff and civilians. <\/p>\n
\u201cWithout information in a communication blackout, people don\u2019t know where to go for safety. Blackouts impede humanitarian and medical personnel from working safely and effectively,\u201d the Red Cross said. <\/p>\n
International news agencies also expressed concern after the IDF said it cannot guarantee the safety of journalists reporting from Gaza, Reuters reported on Friday. <\/p>\n
At least 29 journalists have been killed during the Israel-Hamas war since October 7, making it the deadliest period for reporters covering conflict in decades, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). <\/p>\n
The continuous bombardment of Gaza since hostilities broke out after the bloody October 7 attack has led to a crisis in the impoverished and densely-populated enclave. <\/p>\n
More than 2 million people are affected, the UN Relief Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) \u2013 the main UN agency in Gaza \u2013 warned on Friday, adding that amid food and water shortages, sewage is overflowing on the streets. More than 7,300 people have been killed and 18,500 more injured in Israeli attacks on\u00a0Gaza\u00a0since October 7, according to figures released Friday by the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Ramallah drawn from sources in the Hamas-controlled enclave. <\/p>\n
The ministry says children, women and the elderly make up 70% of those killed. <\/p>\n
Fifty-three UN staffers have also been killed since fighting began, with 14 dead in the past 24 hours, according to an UNRWA statement Friday. <\/p>\n
Gaza hospitals have been forced to work with dwindling resources and power shortages; eyewitnesses at Al Aqsa Martyrs hospital said on Friday the institution had been plunged into darkness. <\/p>\n
One eyewitness said Gaza has been \u201cleft in the dark with no connection to the outside world,\u201d adding the hospital has received the bodies of 11 people killed and dozens injured from the intensified bombardment. They expect casualties to rise. <\/p>\n
Another eyewitness, Alla Majhool, said she came to the hospital because her 4-year-old niece was injured in a previous strike. <\/p>\n
\u201cI am terrified and shaking,\u00a0I\u00a0can\u2019t call my family and sisters to check on them, all we hear is explosions,\u201d Majhool said. \u201cIt\u2019s dark\u00a0and there are\u00a0no communications, we don\u2019t know where the airstrikes and artillery shelling is hitting.\u201d <\/p>\n
The\u00a0Palestine Red Crescent Society said it has \u201ccompletely lost contact with the operations room in Gaza and all our teams operating there.\u201d <\/p>\n
Phillipe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA said earlier on Friday that while aid has begun to trickle into Gaza from Egypt through the Rafah crossing, deliveries so far amounted to \u201cnothing more than crumbs.\u201d <\/p>\n
As the intensified bombardment began, Jordanian foreign minister Ayman Safadi urged nations to vote for a UN resolution calling for a halt to the fighting, saying on social media that the outcome of any Israeli ground operation \u201cwill be a humanitarian catastrophe of epic proportions for years to come.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cMillions will be watching every vote,\u201d he said. \u201cHistory will judge.\u201d <\/p>\n
An overwhelming majority of 120 nations voted for the resolution, which calls for an immediate cessation of hostilities in the war between Israel and Hamas and for aid to be allowed to flow unrestricted into Gaza. The US and Israel sharply criticized the resolution text, however, for not explicitly criticizing Hamas. <\/p>\n
Israel\u2019s ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan asked the assembly, \u201cWhy are you defending murderers?\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cIsrael\u00a0just endured the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, and according to a majority of the so-called family of nations,\u00a0Israel\u00a0has no right to defend itself,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n