Israeli strikes across Gaza kill at least 50, Palestinian officials say

At least 50 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, health officials and first responders say.

Nine people died in the morning when a missile hit a police station in the market area of Jabalia town, in northern Gaza, a local hospital said.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it struck a “command-and-control centre” for Hamas and its ally Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Jabalia that was being used to plan attacks.

Later, the Hamas-run Civil Defence agency said 12 more people were killed when a family home in Jabalia’s Ard Halawa area was bombed, and that others were believed to be missing under the rubble.

The IDF said it was looking at the reports.

Another 29 people were reportedly killed elsewhere in the territory.

They included a family of six – a couple and their four children – whose home in the northern Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood of Gaza City was struck overnight, according to the Civil Defence.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) later identified the man who was killed as Ali al-Sarafiti, who it said was a member of the armed group and a former prisoner who was jailed for 13 years in Israel after being convicted over an attempted suicide attack.

Palestinian media also said three displaced people were killed when their family tent was hit near Nuseirat, in central Gaza, and that two children died in a strike on another tent in the southern Khan Younis area.

“One by one we are getting martyred, dying in pieces,” Rania al-Jumla, who lost her sister in a strike in Khan Younis, told AFP news agency.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said on Thursday morning that at least 1,978 people had been killed since Israel resumed its offensive in Gaza on 18 March following the collapse of a two-month ceasefire.

Israel says it is putting military pressure on Hamas to release the 59 hostages it is still holding, 24 of whom are believed to be alive.

It has also blocked all deliveries of humanitarian aid and other supplies to Gaza for seven weeks, which the UN says is “further depriving people of the means for survival and undermining every aspect of civilian life”.

The UN has urged Israel to end the blockade immediately, saying it has obligations under international law as the occupying power to ensure food and medical supplies for the population, as well as ensuring essential services.

Israel has insisted it is acting in accordance with international law, and that there is no shortage of aid in Gaza because 25,000 lorries entered during the recent ceasefire.

During a visit to southern Gaza on Thursday, the IDF’s Chief of Staff, Lt Gen Eyal Zamir, told troops: “We continue our operational pressure and to tighten our hold on Hamas as needed, and if we do not see progress in the return of the hostages, we will expand our activities into a more intense and significant operation until we reach a decisive outcome.”

“Hamas is responsible for starting this war, Hamas is still cruelly holding the hostages, and is responsible for the dire situation of the population in Gaza,” he added.

The IDF later ordered residents of two areas just to the north-west of Jabalia to evacuate immediately.

It warned that forces were “operating intensely” in Beit Hanoun and Sheikh Zayed “due to ongoing terrorist activities and sniper fire”.

About 420,000 Palestinians – 20% of Gaza’s population – are estimated to have been displaced again over the past five weeks, with almost 70% of the territory under active Israeli evacuation orders, within Israeli-designated “no-go areas”, or both, according to the UN.

The IDF has said the evacuation orders are in accordance with the obligation under international law to take feasible precautions to mitigate harm to civilians by providing advance warnings prior to attacks.

But the UN has warned that the orders have resulted in the “forcible transfer” of civilians into “ever shrinking spaces where they have little or no access to life-saving services” and continue to be subject to attacks.

In a separate development on Thursday, the IDF acknowledged that Israeli tank fire had killed a Bulgarian working for the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS) and wounded five other UN staff on 19 March.

The IDF had initially denied responsibility for the strike on a UN guesthouse in the central Gaza town of Deir al-Balah.

Israel launched a military campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 51,350 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s health ministry.