Israeli troops carry out air, ground attacks in Gaza

CAIRO: Israeli military strikes across the Gaza Strip killed at least 28 Palestinians, including a journalist and rescue workers, medics said on Sunday (Dec 15), and the Israeli military said troops carried out air and ground attacks in the northern Gaza Strip, killing dozens of militants while capturing others.

An Israeli airstrike hit the civil emergency centre in the Nuseirat market area in the central Gaza Strip, killing Ahmed Al-Louh, a video journalist for Al Jazeera TV, and five other people, medics and fellow journalists said.

The TV network said he was working when he was killed. The Israeli military said they were looking into the report. Hamas media said the head of the civil emergency service in Nuseirat, Nedal Abu Hjayyer, was also killed.

"The civil emergency headquarters in Nuseirat camp was hit during the crews' presence, they work around the clock to serve the people," said Zaki Emadeldeen from the civil emergency service to reporters at the hospital.

"The civil emergency service is a humanitarian service and not political, they work in war and peace times for the service of the people," he said, adding that the place was hit directly by Israeli airstrike.

Another air strike hit a group of Hamas-linked men tasked with protecting aid trucks west of Gaza City, and medics said several were killed or wounded but exact figures were unavailable as yet.

Residents said at least 11 people were killed in three separate Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City houses, nine were killed in the towns of Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun and Jabalia camp when clusters of houses were bombed or set ablaze, and two were killed by drone fire in Rafah.

The Israeli military said the three Gaza City houses belonged to militants planning imminent attacks. It said steps were taken to mitigate the risk of harming civilians beforehand, including the use of precise munitions and aerial surveillance.

The military issued a photo showing the weapons it said were seized in Beit Lahiya that including explosives and dozens of grenades.

In Beit Hanoun, Israeli forces besieged families sheltering in Khalil Aweida school before storming it and ordering them to head towards Gaza City, the medics and residents said.

Medics said several people were killed and wounded during the raid on the school while the army detained many men. The number killed was not immediately clear.

The military said it struck down dozens of militants from the air and on the ground and captured others in Beit Hanoun.

Reuters was unable to confirm whether any of the people killed were fighters. Hamas does not disclose its casualties, and the Palestinian health ministry does not distinguish in its daily death toll between combatants and non-combatants.

Separately, Israel said its air force struck a command and control centre in a compound in the Abu Shabak clinic in northern Gaza used by Hamas to store weapons and plan attacks. The Gaza health ministry said the medical centre, which also included a mental health clinic, was destroyed.

Palestinians accuse Israel of carrying out ethnic cleansing to depopulate the areas at the northern edge to create a buffer zone. Israel denies it and says the campaign targets Hamas militants and aims to prevent them from regrouping. The military says it has instructed civilians to evacuate battle zones for their own safety.

The war began when the Palestinian militant group Hamas stormed into Israel on Oct 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking more than 250 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli authorities.

Israel then launched an air, sea and land offensive that has killed almost 45,000 people, mostly civilians, according to authorities in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, displaced nearly the entire population and left much of the enclave in ruins.

A bid by Egypt, Qatar and the United States to reach a truce has gained momentum in recent weeks, yet there has been no news of a breakthrough.