Israeli strikes on Gaza hit houses and kill at least 85, hospitals say

Israeli strikes killed at least 85 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip overnight and into Thursday, according to local health officials.

Hours later, Hamas fired three rockets at Israel without causing casualties, in the first such attack since Israel ended their ceasefire with a surprise bombardment of Gaza on Tuesday.

The Israeli military ordered people to evacuate an area in central Gaza near Khan Younis, saying it would operate there in response to rocket fire from Hamas.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military restored a blockade on northern Gaza, including Gaza City, that it had maintained for most of the war.

It also announced an additional ground operation in northern Gaza near the already largely destroyed town of Beit Lahiya, where strikes have killed dozens over the past 24 hours.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians returned to what remains of their homes in the north after a ceasefire took hold in January.

Israel resumed heavy strikes across Gaza on Tuesday, shattering a ceasefire that had halted the war and facilitated the release of more than two dozen hostages.

Israel blamed the renewed fighting on Hamas because the militant group rejected a new proposal that departed from their signed agreement.

The Trump administration, which took credit for helping to broker the ceasefire, has voiced full support for Israel.

More than 400 Palestinians were killed on Tuesday alone, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The military said three rockets were fired out of Gaza on Thursday, with one intercepted and two falling in open areas. Hamas claimed the attack and said it had targeted Tel Aviv.

Earlier, the Israeli military said it intercepted a missile launched by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels early on Thursday before it reached Israeli airspace, as air raid sirens and exploding interceptors were heard in Jerusalem. No injuries were reported. It was the second such attack since the US began a new campaign of airstrikes against the rebels earlier this week.

One of the strikes on Gaza early on Thursday hit the Abu Daqa family’s home in Abasan al-Kabira, a village just outside of Khan Younis near the border with Israel. It was inside an area the Israeli military had ordered be evacuated earlier this week, encompassing most of eastern Gaza.

The strike killed at least 16 people, mostly women and children, according to the nearby European Hospital, which received the dead. Those killed included a father and his seven children, as well as the parents and brother of a month-old baby who survived along with her
grandparents.

“The house collapsed over the people’s heads.”

The Israeli military said it had struck dozens of militant targets across Gaza.

On Wednesday, Israeli ground troops advanced in Gaza for the first time since the ceasefire took hold in January, seizing part of a corridor separating the northern third of the territory from the south.

The announcement about passage to the south indicated troops will soon retake full control over what is known as the Netzarim corridor, stretching from the border to the Mediterranean Sea.

Israel, which has also cut off the supply of food, fuel and humanitarian aid to Gaza’s roughly two million Palestinians, has vowed to intensify its operations until Hamas releases the 59 hostages it holds — 35 of whom are believed dead — and gives up control of the territory. The Trump administration, which took credit for brokering the ceasefire, says it fully supports Israel.

Hamas has said it will only release the remaining hostages in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, as called for in the ceasefire agreement they reached in January after more than a year of mediation by the US, Egypt and Qatar.

Gaza’s health ministry said the overnight strikes killed at least 85 people, mostly women and children. Zaher al-Waheidi, the official in charge of records for the ministry, said a total of 592 people have been killed in Israeli strikes since Tuesday.

The Indonesian Hospital said it had received 19 bodies after strikes in Beit Lahiya, near the border.

“It was a bloody night for the people of Beit Lahiya,” said Fares Awad, head of the health ministry’s emergency service in northern Gaza, adding that rescuers were still searching the rubble from homes that were hit.

“The situation is catastrophic,” he added

Beit Lahiya was heavily destroyed and largely depopulated during the first phase of the war before January’s ceasefire. On Wednesday, an Israeli strike on a gathering of mourners killed 17 people there, according to health officials.

The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on October 7 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostage.

Most of the hostages have been freed in ceasefire agreements or other deals. Israeli forces have rescued eight living hostages and recovered the bodies of dozens more.

The war at its height displaced around 90% of Gaza’s population and has caused vast destruction across the territory. Hundreds of thousands of people returned to their homes during the ceasefire, but many found only fields of rubble and the bombed-out shells of buildings.

Meanwhile, hundreds of Israelis gathered outside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s residence in Jerusalem on Thursday to protest against his handling of the hostage crisis and his plan to fire the country’s head of internal security.

Police used a water canon to disperse the crowd after protesters tried to break through police barricades.

A mass march and demonstration on Wednesday outside the Israeli parliament continued into the late evening hours and ended with several arrests.