People look for survivors in the rubble of a building hit in an Israeli strike in the Bureij camp for Palestinian refugees in the central Gaza Strip on Friday. — AFP GAZA CITY, May 02 (Agencies): Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli strikes killed at least 29 people Friday in the Palestinian territory, devastated by war and under a total Israeli aid blockade for two months.
Israel resumed its military campaign in the Gaza Strip on March 18 after the collapse of a ceasefire that had largely halted the fighting.
Nine people were killed when an Israeli air strike hit a home in Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, civil defence official Mohammed al-Mughayyir told AFP.
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said on Thursday that at least 2,326 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes, bringing the overall death toll since the war broke out to 52,418.
Meanwhile, two months into Israel's full blockade on aid into Gaza, humanitarians described Friday horrific scenes of starving, bloodied children and people fighting over water, with aid operations on the "verge of total collapse".
The United Nations and the Red Cross sounded the alarm at the dire situation in the war-ravaged Palestinian territory, demanding international action.
"The humanitarian response in Gaza is on the verge of total collapse," the International Committee of the Red Cross warned in a statement.
"Without immediate action, Gaza will descend further into chaos that humanitarian efforts will not be able to mitigate."
Israel strictly controls all inflows of international aid vital for the 2.4 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
It halted aid deliveries to Gaza on March 2, days before the collapse of a ceasefire that had significantly reduced hostilities after 15 months of war.
Since the start of the blockade, the United Nations has repeatedly warned of the humanitarian catastrophe on the ground, with famine again looming.
The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) said a week ago that it had sent out its "last remaining food stocks" to kitchens.
"Food stocks have now mainly run out," Olga Cherevko, a spokeswoman for the UN humanitarian agency OCHA, told reporters in Geneva Friday via video link from Gaza City.
"Community kitchens have begun to shut down (and) more people are going hungry," she said, pointing to reports of children and other very vulnerable people who have died from malnutrition and ... from the lack of food".
"The blockade is deadly."
Water access was also "becoming impossible", she warned.
Syrian Druze leader slams 'genocidal campaign', Israel issues warning
Syrian Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri on Thursday condemned what he called a "genocidal campaign" against his community after two days of sectarian clashes left 102 people dead.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz warned his country would respond "with significant force" if Syria's new authorities fail to protect the Druze minority, whose representatives rejected any attempt to force them out.
The violence poses a serious challenge to the Islamist authorities who ousted longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December.
West Bank Palestinians losing hope
100 days into Israeli assault
On a torn-up road near the refugee camp where she once lived, Saja Bawaqneh said she struggled to find hope 100 days after an Israeli offensive in the occupied West Bank forced her to flee.
Tens of thousands of Palestinians have been displaced in the north of the territory since Israel began a major "anti-terrorist operation" dubbed "Iron Wall" on January 21.
Bawaqneh said life was tough and uncertain since she was forced to leave Jenin refugee camp-one of three targeted by the offensive along with Tulkarem and Nur Shams.
"We try to hold on to hope, but unfortunately, reality offers none," she told AFP.
© 2025 - All Rights with The Financial Express
