Israel launches fresh strikes on Gaza amid ceasefire
Gaza - Gaza health authorities said fresh Israeli air strikes killed four people Thursday as Qatar, a mediator of the weeks-long ceasefire, warned that renewed attacks threatened to undermine the fragile truce between Israel and Hamas.
The new strikes came the morning after one of the deadliest days in the Gaza Strip since the truce came into effect on October 10, and after Israel launched a string of attacks in Lebanon despite the nearly year-long ceasefire there.
The Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in southern Gaza said four people were killed in the strikes early Thursday, after the territory's civil defense agency gave a lower toll of three dead.
The hospital said three from one family, including a one-year-old girl, were killed in a strike on a house east of Khan Younis and one more person was killed in an air strike on the town of Abasan al-Kabira, also east of Khan Younis.
A source at Gaza's interior ministry, who did not wish to be identified, said artillery fire was continuing in the Khan Younis area.
Qatar condemned what it called the "brutal" Israeli air strikes, saying they were "a dangerous escalation that threatens to undermine the ceasefire agreement."
Gazans voiced despair at the fresh wave of attacks, saying it felt on the ground like Israel's two-year assault was continuing.
"We are worried about the war returning. The sound of artillery shelling and explosions from the demolition operations east of Gaza was terrifying last night," Lina Kuraz (33) from the Tuffah neighborhood, east of Gaza City, told AFP.
"My daughter kept asking me all night, 'Will the war come back?' Every time we try to regain hope, the shelling starts again. When will this nightmare end?
"The war hasn't ended"
The so-called yellow line demarcates the boundary inside the Gaza Strip that Israeli troops have withdrawn behind, as part of the US-brokered ceasefire.
"We are aware of a strike east of the yellow line that was done to dismantle terror infrastructures," the Israeli military told AFP. "We're not aware of the reported casualties. It's part of the regular IDF (Israeli military) operations east of the yellow line."
Israel has carried out repeated strikes against what it claims are Hamas targets during the ceasefire, resulting in the death of more than 312 Palestinians, according to the health ministry in Gaza.
Wednesday's Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip left 27 dead, according to the civil defense agency.
"The war hasn't ended. Nothing has really changed," said Mohammed Hamdouna (36), who was displaced from northern Gaza to a tent in Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis.
"The intensity of the death toll has decreased, but martyrs and shelling happen every day. We are still living in tents. The cities are rubble, the crossings are still closed, and all the basic necessities of life are still lacking," he told AFP.
Hamas appeals to mediators
Hamas urged US President Donald Trump and other international mediators of the weeks-long truce to put pressure on Israel to stop its attacks.
"This violation requires serious and effective action from the mediators to pressure (Israel) to stop these violations and uphold the ceasefire agreement," Hazem Qassem, a Hamas spokesperson, told AFP in Gaza City.
"The occupation is acting with blatant disregard to the mediators' efforts," he said.
Israel's has killed at least 69,546 people in Gaza since October 2023, according to the territory's health ministry, though the true number is believed to be far higher.
Israel also conducted several strikes in southern Lebanon on Wednesday.
The military claimed it targeted Hezbollah weapons storage facilities in several towns, and accused the group of trying to rebuild its capabilities.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday also drew a rebuke from Damascus and others in the region after visiting Israeli troops deployed in a buffer zone inside Syria.
Cover photo: Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP