By Nidal al-Mughrabi
CAIRO (Reuters) – Israel’s military issued new evacuation orders in the north of the Gaza Strip on Tuesday after carrying out strikes across the enclave which Palestinian media and medics said had killed at least 30 people.
An air strike damaged two houses in the town of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, where the army has carried out new operations since Oct. 5, and killed at least 20 people late on Monday, the Palestinian official news agency WAFA and Hamas media said.
Four other people were killed in the central Gazan town of Al-Zawayda around midnight on Monday, medics said.
The Gaza health ministry did not immediately confirm the tolls but Palestinian health officials said six people had also been killed in two separate Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City and Deir Al-Balah in the central area of the narrow enclave.
The Israeli military said, without giving details, that its forces had “eliminated terrorists” in the central Gaza Strip and Jabalia area. Israeli troops had also located weapons and explosives over the past day in the southern Rafah area, where “terrorist infrastructure sites” had been eliminated, it said.
Later on Tuesday, Israeli planes dropped leaflets over Beit Lahiya ordering residents who have not yet left their homes and shelters housing displaced families to quit the town completely.
“To all those who remained at homes and shelters, you are risking your lives. For your safety you have to head south,” said the leaflet, which was written in Arabic.
Palestinians said the new attacks and Israeli orders for people to evacuate were aimed at emptying two northern Gaza towns and a refugee camp to create buffer zones.
Israel says the evacuations are meant to keep civilians out of harm’s way as its troops battle Hamas fighters. Hundreds of Palestinian gunmen have been killed or captured in the area of Jabalia over the past month, the military says.
PATIENTS TO BE EVACUATED
More than 43,300 Palestinians have been killed in more than a year of war in Gaza, the authorities in Gaza say, and much of the territory has been reduced to ruins.
The war began after Hamas-led militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
Announcing a rare transfer of patients out of Gaza, a World Health Organization official said more than 100 people would be evacuated from Gaza on Wednesday, including children suffering from trauma injuries and chronic diseases.
They will travel via the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel before flying to the United Arab Emirates, said Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative for the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
Some will then go on to Romania, he said, adding that 12,000 people were awaiting transfer.
In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said at least four people were killed on Tuesday during an Israeli military raid and airstrikes.
The Israeli military said its aircraft had targeted a group of gunmen and that its forces had arrested 60 militants.
Violence has surged in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza, with almost daily sweeps by Israeli forces that have involved thousands of arrests and regular gunbattles between security forces and Palestinian fighters.
(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi and Ali Sawafta, Additional reporting by Emma Farge in Geneva, Editing by Timothy Heritage)
