On Saturday, day 169 of the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip, Israeli occupation forces bombed the northern part of Rafah, and shelled the northern and central Gaza Strip with tanks.
According to local sources, the Israeli occupation forces shelled artillery northwest of Beit Hanoun and the vicinity of Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, and north of Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.
Israeli troops bombed Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza on Saturday morning.
A number of Palestinian family members, including children, were killed and others were wounded, at dawn on Saturday, in an Israeli raid on the north of the city of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. According to local sources, Israeli warplanes raided a two-storey house in Mirage area, north of Rafah, killing five civilians and wounding others.
In the same context, Israeli artillery shelled the town of Al-Qarara, north of Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip.
Israeli forces have killed 32,070 Palestinians in Gaza in the last 5 months. Additionally, Israeli troops injured over 74,298 Palestinians in Gaza. According to the latest reports, Israeli troops killed 82 Palestinians and 110 injuries in just the past 24 hours.
The five months of bombardment and displacement has led to an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe and massive destruction of infrastructure.
The Israeli military is continuing its siege of the al-Shifa Hospital, in central Gaza, for the sixth day. Israeli forces kidnapped most of the medical staff and electricity cutoff resulted
in many deaths in the intensive care unit.
According to a report by Mondoweiss.net, Israel threatened to blow up the hospital if those who are still inside do not surrender or evacuate. The Israeli military has already completely destroyed the surgical department of the hospital, where tens of thousands of wounded Palestinians have had their lives saved over the past five months, thanks to the tireless surgeons working day and night there. The Israeli military released a photo collage of claimed “terrorists” who they claimed they had captured in the hospital – but the list was shown to contain 58 duplicate photos, while most of the remainder were men who had previously been killed, were already imprisoned by Israel, or were out of Gaza.
According to Mondoweiss, “The siege on al-Shifa comes in the context of Israel’s attempt to target civil employees and members of the police in Gaza who were based in al-Shifa, in an attempt to sow civil unrest and cause a breakdown in social order in the north. Claiming these civil employees to be “top Hamas operatives,” Israel assassinated the Director of the Operations of the Gaza Police, Faiq Mabhouh, who was an instrumental figure in successfully coordinating the delivery of humanitarian aid to northern Gaza in cooperation with international organizations, local tribes, and UNRWA. In light of the widespread compliance of the populace with the directives of Gaza’s civil employees, Israel has laid siege of al-Shifa where many of them are based, claiming them to be armed Hamas fighters.”
The Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said in a statement that Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters were “barricading themselves inside of the emergency room.” But medical workers on the ground have challenged this claim as an outright lie.
Mondoweiss reported that the Israeli military said they are “evacuating” around 220 patients to another location — but given that there is no coordination between the Israeli military and international bodies, evacuating people is incredibly dangerous.
According to the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, a survivor who asked to be identified only as “M.K.” confirmed that Israeli soldiers repeatedly took prisoners into the hospital’s morgue area, that gunshots were then heard, and that the soldiers left without the prisoners. “The soldiers detained me and handcuffed me in the hospital courtyard; I was left undressed for more than nine hours,” M.K. stated.
“About four times during that period, I saw soldiers lead groups of detainees—[always] at least three people and [never] more than 10—into the hospital buildings, particularly the morgue building where bodies had previously been kept,” added M.K. “Gunshots were heard, with the soldiers then leaving the area to bring another group there.”
Another witness, who preferred to remain completely anonymous due to safety concerns, and who was able to leave Al-Shifa Medical Complex recently, confirmed to the Euro-Med Monitor team that he witnessed Israeli forces taking eight or 10 Palestinian civilians at a time towards the morgue area. He then heard heavy gunfire, and the Israeli forces later left without the civilians.
Israeli troops killed the police chief in Gaza city in charge of coordinating humanitarian affairs with UN agencies. The situation of the half a million people who remain in Gaza city is getting worse daily. Here is a graphic (CAUTION) example of one of hundreds of massacres committed by Israeli forces:
https://freepalestinemovement.
The daily flood of videos and images continues. Here is the execution of four unarmed civilians documented by an Israeli drone image (the drone was shot down by Palestinian resistance)
https://twitter.com/luigidanie
Here is testimony of a survivor who was buried alive under rubble:
https://www.middleeasteye.net/
In the US, Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner called for the ethnic cleansing of the Gaza Strip, saying that Gaza’s “waterfront property could be very valuable.”
