Israel steps up pressure on northern Gaza, 16 killed across the territory

Israeli strikes across Gaza killed 16 people on Wednesday as Israeli forces stepped up pressure on northern areas of the Palestinian enclave, besieged hospital and refugee shelters, and ordered residents to head south, medics and residents said.

The Gaza health ministry and the World Health Organization said they would be unable to start a polio vaccination campaign in northern Gaza as planned because of the intense bombardments, mass displacements and lack of access in northern Gaza.

Israeli forces began the operation in the north about three weeks ago with the declared aim of preventing Hamas fighters from regrouping, but the operation intensified after the killing of Hamas chief Yehya Al-Sinwar last Wednesday.

The Israeli military announced last Friday it had sent another army unit to Jabalia and began besieging refugee shelters, forcing displaced people to leave while rounding up many of the men. The health ministry said at least 650 people had been killed since the new offensive began.

Medics said two Palestinians were killed in Beit Lahiya, while an airstrike killed 12 others in Gaza City, including four municipality workers, in two separate strikes on Wednesday.

Two other Palestinians were killed in an airstrike in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza Strip, they said.

Health and civil emergency officials said dozens of bodies of Palestinians killed by Israel fire in and around Jabalia were scattered on roadsides and under the rubble where medical teams could not reach them.

In northern Gaza, residents said Israeli forces had besieged hospitals, schools, and other shelters housing displaced families and ordered them to leave and head south.

Health officials said hospitals there have either stopped providing medical services or were hardly operating because of the ongoing offensive and the depletion of medical resources.

They added that hospitals, where medics have refused Israeli army orders to evacuate, were running out of blood units, as well as coffins and shrouds to prepare the bodies of the dead.

The Gaza health ministry made a desperate call on Wednesday.

“We call on the world, which has failed to provide protection and shelter for our people and has been unable to deliver food and medicine, to make an effort to send shrouds for our fallen,” the health ministry in a statement.

The ministry also said the escalation meant a campaign to vaccinate children against polio had been postponed, after the phases covering central and southern Gaza had finished.

“We have not been able to launch the campaign to vaccinate 120,000 children in Gaza City and northern Gaza today because of the siege and the Israeli aggression,” health ministry official Majdi Dhair said. “Reaching the targeted category is difficult so we had to postpone.”

The WHO confirmed the postponement.

CALL FOR TRUCE

On Tuesday, the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency called for a temporary truce to allow people to leave areas of northern Gaza as health officials said they were running out of supplies to treat the injured.

Washington has called on Israel to allow more humanitarian supplies into northern Gaza and Israel says aid has been delivered in scores of trucks as well as air drops, but Gaza medics say the aid has not reached them.

Israel’s military humanitarian unit, COGAT, which oversees aid and commercial shipments to Gaza, said on Tuesday that 237 trucks containing humanitarian aid, including food, water, medical supplies, and shelter equipment from Jordan and the international community, were transferred to the northern Gaza Strip over the past eight days.

The aid was transferred following thorough security checks, the military said. It added that Israel “will continue to act in accordance with international law to facilitate and ease the humanitarian response to the Gaza Strip.”

Palestinian health officials and residents said no aid has been allowed into Jabalia, Beit Hanoun, and Beit Lahiya.

The Israeli military said its forces were operating against Hamas militants who staged attacks from there, and that they killed scores of militants and destroyed military infrastructure while helping residents who heeded evacuation orders to leave.

There is no intense fighting on the ground, but the armed wings of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad said fighters attacked Israeli troops in northern Gaza with anti-tank rockets and mortar fire.

The overall death toll in Gaza is approaching 43,000, according to the latest health ministry figures, and most of the 2.3 million population is displaced.

The Israeli offensive was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed and around 250 taken as hostages back into Gaza.