Humanitarian crisis deepens amid ongoing fighting in Gaza

The fighting between the Israeli army and the Palestinian Hamas movement continued on Friday in the Gaza Strip despite "initial" indications of the possibility of reaching a new ceasefire and releasing hostages after about four months of war.

The humanitarian situation is deteriorating in the besieged enclave, especially amidst poor weather conditions and rain, causing floods in the tents of the displaced, especially in the south, according to reporters who told AFP.

The fighting intensified, especially in the vicinity of Nasser and Al-Amal hospitals, which are overcrowded with casualties and displaced people, according to witnesses and the Palestinian Red Crescent.

The Red Crescent Society said on Friday in a statement that shelling and gunfire continued in the vicinity of the Al-Amal Hospital, affiliated with the society, in Khan Yunis.

It pointed out "the leakage of rainwater on the displaced persons" inside some parts of the hospital due to damage to the buildings due to the shelling.

It warned of "the risk of kidney patients being in danger due to the inability to transfer them to other hospitals" due to the ongoing Israeli blockade of the hospital.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who visited Khan Yunis on Thursday, said that a "harsh blow" was directed at Hamas during the war that erupted following an unprecedented attack by the movement on the Israeli state, resulting in the death of 1,160 people, according to a count by AFP based on official numbers.

Yoav Gallant pointed to the killing of "ten thousand Hamas terrorists" and the wounding of "ten thousand others."

Israel pledged to "eliminate" Hamas in response to the October 7th attack, and has since responded with devastating airstrikes on the Gaza Strip controlled by the Islamic movement, followed by an attack by land since October 27th. 

Twenty-seven thousand one hundred thirty-one people have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war, most of them civilians, according to the latest tally from the Ministry of Health in the Hamas government.

Hamas does not generally announce its human losses.

Witnesses reported Israeli airstrikes in the central and southern Gaza Strip on Thursday night, especially in Khan Yunis, where Israeli operations have been concentrated for weeks.

The Ministry of Health, affiliated with Hamas, has recorded at least 112 people killed in the last twenty-four hours in the Gaza Strip.

The United Nations has declared the Gaza Strip "unfit for habitation," 1.7 million people have been displaced, according to the United Nations, out of about 2.4 million, which is the population.

One million and 300 hundred of them are stranded in the city of Rafah near the closed border with Egypt, threatened with famine and epidemics.

About 250 hostages were abducted to the Gaza Strip during the Hamas attack, and about 132 of them are still detained, with at least 27 believed to have been killed.


AFP