Israeli strike kills at least 73 in northern Gaza, medics say

[Pelican Press 0]

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******** strike ****** at least 73 in northern Gaza, medics say

data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///ywAAAAAAQABAAACAUwAOw==Reuters

Beit Lahia has been hit by earlier strikes, pictured here in June

******** strikes have ******* at least 73 people, including women and children, in the city of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza, the strip’s ******-run authorities say.

Dozens of others are injured and many are still trapped under the rubble after the ******** late on Saturday night, officials added.

******* said it was checking reports of casualties but said the figures published by ****** authorities were “exaggerated” and did not match information held by its military.

The latest strikes come just hours after reports of “heavy gunfire” from ******** troops at the Indonesian Hospital in the city.

Rescue efforts in Beit Lahia are currently hampered due to communications and internet services being severed in the region, Gaza health officials said.

The ******-run government media office said the ******** hit “crowded” residential areas, and that 73 people had been ******* – a number also reported by Gaza’s civil defence agency. The BBC cannot independently verify the figures.

According to ************ news agency Wafa, an entire residential complex was destroyed in the strikes.

The ******* Defense Forces (IDF) told the BBC it had struck a “****** ******* target” and was “doing everything possible to avoid causing harm to civilians”.

It said the casualties given by the ****** office were “exaggerated” and said such sources had “proven to be sorely unreliable in previous incidents.”

******* began a renewed military offensive in northern Gaza in early October, saying it is trying to prevent ****** from regrouping in the area.

In particular, ******** forces have surrounded and bombarded the densely-populated Jabalia area, which includes an urban ******** camp –

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Humanitarian groups have warned that virtually no aid has entered the area in the past few weeks. *******’s own statistics show that aid deliveries to Gaza as a whole have collapsed when compared with the same ******* in September.

The UN’s top humanitarian official, Joyce Msuya, said on Saturday that Palestinians in northern Gaza are enduring “unspeakable horrors” and called for these “atrocities” to stop.

An ******** minister, Amichai Chikli, told the BBC ******* had “blockaded” parts of northern Gaza.

“We allowed the civilian population to escape into the safe zone, and we prevented supplies to enter the blockade region,” he told the Newshour programme – referring to the IDF having warned people in the north to evacuate.

He insisted this was “legal according to the international law”.

******* has repeatedly denied it is preventing humanitarian aid from entering Gaza but the US has told it to boost access or risk having some ********* military assistance cut off.

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Beit Lahia is near Jabalia, which has been the focus of *******’s military offensive in the past fortnight

Meanwhile,

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on Saturday, in the heaviest ******* the Lebanese capital has witnessed in more than a week.

Damage and casualties were still being assessed, but at least one multi-storey building in the city’s southern suburbs had been completely destroyed.

The ******** military said it had targeted Hezbollah’s weapons storage facilities and its intelligence headquarters command centre in Dahieh.

Hezbollah also continued to ***** rockets into northern *******, with the ******** military saying about 200 projectiles – which usually means rockets – were fired on Saturday.

One person was ******* by shrapnel while in his car, *******’s medical service Magen David Adom said.

Also on Saturday, ******** Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said

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on his private residence.

“The attempt by Iran’s proxy Hezbollah to ************ me and my wife today was a grave mistake,” he wrote in a post on X.

Mr Netanyahu and his wife were not at home at the time, and no one was injured.

Iran says Hezbollah was behind the reported *******, Iranian state news agency IRNA reported. Hezbollah – which is funded and equipped by Iran – has not commented on the reports.

At least 42,519 people have been ******* and tens of thousands injured in Gaza since the war began last October, the ******-run authorities say.

The war began after ****** attacked ******* on 7 October 2023, leaving around 1,200 people ***** and 251 taken to Gaza as hostages. ******* vowed to ******** ****** in response.

Earlier this week, the ******** of ****** leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza raised some hopes in some quarters of an end to the conflict.

But the group’s deputy leader said ****** would only be strengthened, and that ******** hostages would not be returned until ******* withdrew from Gaza.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, also said on Saturday that Sinwar’s ****** would not halt the “Axis of Resistance” – the regional network of Iran-backed, heavily armed militias that oppose *******.

“****** is alive and will remain alive,” Khamenei’s statement added.

BBC Verify analyses footage of the ****** leader Yahya Sinwar’s ********

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