DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — At least 39 people were killed by Israeli strikes in northern Gaza on Saturday, according to Palestinian and hospital officials, as rescuers rushed to find survivors under the rubble.
Fadel Naem, director of al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City, told The Associated Press that more than three dozen bodies had arrived at the hospital. The Palestinian Civil Defense, an emergency group operating in Gaza, said its aid workers were digging for survivors at the site of an attack in the Shati refugee camp west of Gaza City and had recovered several dozen bodies from a building that had been hit by an Israeli soldier. strike in an eastern neighborhood of Gaza City.
Israel said on Saturday that its fighter jets hit two Hamas military sites in the Gaza City area, but did not elaborate.
The deaths come a day after at least 25 people were killed in attacks on tent camps and 50 were injured near the southern city of Rafah. Israel said on Saturday it was continuing to operate in central and southern Gaza and pressing ahead with the invasion of Rafah, where more than a million Palestinians had taken refuge from fighting elsewhere. Most have now fled the city, but the United Nations says no place in Gaza is safe and humanitarian conditions are dire as families shelter in tents and cramped apartments without adequate food, water or medical supplies.
A separate Israeli attack on Saturday in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley killed a member of the military wing of al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Group, a Sunni Muslim faction closely linked to Hamas, according to the group. The member was the seventh member killed by Israeli attacks in Lebanon since the war began.
The war between Israel and Hamas broke out on October 7 when Hamas militants storming southern Israel killed about 1,200 people and took some 250 others hostage. Israel responded by bombing and invading the enclave, killing more than 37,400 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between fighters and civilians in its count.
Also Saturday, the Israeli military said an Israeli man was fatally shot in the northern West Bank town of Qalqilya, where Israeli forces shot dead two militants on Friday, the latest outbreak of violence in the area since the outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas.
At least 549 Palestinians in the area have been killed by Israeli fire since the war began, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry, which tracks killings. Palestinians in the West Bank killed at least nine Israelis, including five soldiers, during the same period, according to UN data.
Israeli citizens are prohibited from entering Qalqilya and other West Bank areas under the control of the Palestinian Authority.
In April, the death of a 14-year-old Israeli settler led to a series of settler attacks on Palestinian towns in the area. The army said a Palestinian was later arrested in connection with the killing.
On Saturday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said a 12-year-old Palestinian boy died from his wounds after being shot by Israeli forces in Ramallah last week. In response to the shooting, the Israeli army said its forces entered the al-Amari refugee camp near Ramallah on Friday to arrest a suspect and then opened fire on a group of Palestinians pelting them with stones.
Israel said on Saturday it was investigating a separate incident into the conduct of its soldiers after a video emerged online showing an injured Palestinian being carried on the hood of an Israeli armored car in the northern West Bank. The military said the man in the video was a wanted suspect and was wounded during a firefight between Palestinian militants and Israeli forces near the city of Jenin. The man was transported to a nearby Red Crescent ambulance, the report said. The military said the behavior in the video was not “consistent with the values” of the military.
Israel captured the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, during the 1967 Middle East war. Palestinians are seeking these areas as part of their hoped-for independent state.
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Jeffery reported from Ramallah and Associated Press writer Bassem Mroue in Beirut contributed to this report.
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Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Gaza at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
