Israeli airstrikes killed 11 Palestinians in Gaza

Nidal al-Mughrabi

CAIRO (Reuters) – Israeli military strikes in the Gaza Strip have killed at least 11 Palestinians, health officials in the enclave said on Sunday, as Israeli warplanes bombed several northern, central and southern areas.

The buildings hit included a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, killing four people and injuring several others, Gaza medics said.

The Israeli military said it attacked Hamas fighters operating from a command center located on the premises that previously served as the Um Al-Fahm school. She accused Hamas of using civilian facilities and its population for military purposes, which Hamas denies.

Doctors said another strike at a home in Gaza City killed three people. Four other people were killed in three separate airstrikes on Nuseirat and Khan Younis in central and southern Gaza.

According to Hamas residents and media, Israeli forces continued their operations in Rafah, near the border with Egypt, and in the Gaza City suburb of Zeitoun, where forces blew up several houses.

On Sunday, the Israeli military said its armed forces were continuing to fight a “multi-front war” and were operating in Gaza to bring home Israeli and foreign hostages and “dismantle” Hamas.

It said soldiers discovered and dismantled an approximately 1 km-long underground tunnel near residential buildings and civilian spaces in central Gaza, adding that they found several rooms and equipment used by Hamas for an extended period of time.

Fighting and Israeli military activity in Gaza declined last week as Israel stepped up its military offensive against Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, killing its leader Hassan Nasrallah in an airstrike on Friday. On Saturday, the group announced Nasrallah’s death.

According to Gaza health authorities, most of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has been displaced by the war, which has killed 41,500 Palestinians.

Israel and Hamas have been fighting since gunmen from the Palestinian militant group entered southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli data.

(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by David Goodman)