GAZA, Sept 14 (AP): A barrage of airstrikes killed at least 32 people across Gaza City as Israel ramps up its offensive there and urges Palestinians to evacuate, medical staff reported Saturday.
The dead included 12 children, according to the morgue in Shifa Hospital, where the bodies were brought. Israel in recent day has intensified strikes across Gaza City, destroying multiple high-rise buildings and accusing Hamas of putting surveillance equipment in them.
On Saturday the army said it struck another high-rise used by Hamas in the area of Gaza City. It has ordered residents to leave, part of an offensive aimed at taking over Gaza territory's largest city, which it says is Hamas' last stronghold. Hundreds of thousands of people remain there, struggling under conditions of famine.
One of the strikes overnight and into early morning Saturday hit a house in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, killing a family of 10, including a mother and her three children, said health officials. The Palestinian Football Association said a player for the Al-Helal Sporting Club, Mohammed Ramez Sultan, was killed in the strikes with 14 members of his family. Images showed the strikes hitting followed by plumes of smoke.
Meanwhile, relatives of Israeli hostages held by Hamas rallied in Tel Aviv on Saturday to demand a deal to release their loved ones and criticized what they said was a counterproductive approach by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in securing a resolution.
Einav Zangauker, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, described as a "spectacular failure" Israel's attempted assassination of Hamas leaders in Qatar this week.
"President Trump said yesterday that every time there is progress in the negotiations, Netanyahu bombs someone. But it wasn't Hamas leaders he tried to bomb - it was our chance, as families, to bring our loved ones home," Zangauker said.
In the wake of escalating hostilities and calls to evacuate the city, the number of people leaving has spiked in recent weeks, according to aid workers. However, many families remain stuck because of the cost of finding transportation and housing, while others having been displaced too many times and don't want to move again, not trusting that anywhere in the enclave is safe.
In a message on social media Saturday, Israel's army told the remaining Palestinians in Gaza City to leave "immediately" and move south to what it's calling a humanitarian zone.
Army spokesman Avichay Adraee said more than a quarter of a million people had left Gaza City, from an estimated 1 million who live in the area of north Gaza around the city.
