BEIRUT — Residents in northern Gaza reported intense Israeli shelling on Saturday, following airstrikes that killed at least 22 people. Israel continued to urge residents in northern Gaza and southern Lebanon to evacuate ahead of its military operations against Hamas and Hezbollah.
In Lebanon, the United Nations peacekeeping force reported that its headquarters in Naqoura was again targeted, with a peacekeeper injured by gunfire late Friday. The peacekeeper is in stable condition. The identity of the shooter remains unclear. The incident occurred a day after Israel’s military fired on the headquarters for the second consecutive day. Israel, which has instructed the peacekeepers to vacate their positions, did not immediately respond to inquiries.
Concerns about hunger intensified as residents in northern Gaza reported receiving no aid since the beginning of the month. The U.N. World Food Program confirmed that no food aid had entered the north since Oct. 1. An estimated 400,000 people remain in the area.
Israel’s military resumed its offensive in northern Gaza nearly a week ago while escalating its air and ground campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon. Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported an Israeli airstrike on an apartment building in the Zarout coastal area near Barja, south of Beirut. The Health Ministry confirmed four fatalities in the incident. The ministry also reported that another airstrike in the village of Maisra, northeast of Beirut, resulted in five deaths.
According to the Lebanese Health Ministry, the total death toll in Lebanon resulting from the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hezbollah has reached 2,255 over the past year. Hezbollah continued its rocket attacks on Israel.
“We will continue to stand with the Lebanese people during these challenging times, as well as with the Palestinian people,” declared Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament, on Saturday during a visit to the site of an Israeli airstrike in Beirut.
Gaza residents are trapped
In northern Gaza, residents told The Associated Press that many were trapped in their homes and shelters with dwindling supplies. Bodies remained uncollected in the streets as the bombing hampered emergency responders.
Those who rushed to the scene of the latest deadly airstrikes in the urban refugee camp of Jabaliya discovered a 20-meter (65-foot) deep crater where a home once stood.
As of Saturday morning, at least 20 bodies had been recovered, with the possibility of others trapped under the rubble, according to emergency service officials. In another part of Jabaliya, a strike on a home killed two brothers and injured a woman and a newborn baby, the officials reported.
Another strike in the afternoon hit a Jabaliya home and killed at least four people, including a woman, said Fares Abu Hamza, an official with the emergency service.
Israel’s military did not immediately respond to requests for comment regarding the strikes. Military spokesperson Avichay Adraee advised people in parts of Jabaliya and Gaza City to evacuate southward to an Israeli-designated humanitarian zone, warning that Israel intends to employ significant force “and will continue to do so for a long time.”
Israel has repeatedly returned to parts of Gaza as Hamas and other militants regroup. The war has destroyed vast areas of Gaza and displaced approximately 90% of its population of 2.3 million people, often on multiple occasions.
Once again, families were seen moving south on foot, in donkey carts, or packed into vehicles navigating piles of rubble. Others refused to evacuate.
“It’s like the first days of the war,” remarked Ahmed Abu Goneim, a Jabaliya resident. “The occupation is doing everything to uproot us. But we will not leave.”
The 24-year-old said Israeli warplanes and drones had struck numerous neighboring houses in the past week. He counted 15 relatives and neighbors, including four women and five children as young as 3, killed in nearby homes. He reported dead bodies lying in the streets, noting that “no one is able to recover them because of the bombing.”
Hamza Sharif, who is staying with his family in a school converted into a shelter in Jabaliya, described “constant bombings day and night.”
He said the shelter had not received aid since the beginning of the month. “Families depend on what they have stored, but they will run out of supplies very soon,” he said.
Food is running out
The World Food Program stated it was unclear how long the limited food supplies distributed in northern Gaza earlier would last.
Last month, the U.N.’s independent investigator on the right to food accused Israel of conducting a “starvation campaign” against Palestinians, which Israel has denied.
Israel’s offensive in Gaza began after Hamas’s attack on Oct. 7, during which militants stormed into Israel, killing over 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 others hostage.
Israel’s offensive has resulted in the deaths of over 42,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not distinguish between combatants and civilians. Gaza’s Health Ministry reported that hospitals had received the bodies of 49 people killed in the past 24 hours.