Israel orders more Gaza evacuations after school shelter attack kills scores
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Palestinians fleeing the eastern part of Khan Younis following another Israeli army evacuation order.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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CAIRO – Israel expanded evacuation orders in Khan Younis in southern Gaza overnight on Aug 10, forcing tens of thousands of Palestinians to leave in the dark as explosions from tank shelling reverberated around them.
An Israeli air strike on Aug 10 on a school where displaced Palestinians were sheltering in Gaza City killed at least 90 people, prompting an international outcry
The Israeli military said it struck a Hamas and Islamic Jihad militant command post – an allegation the two groups rejected as a pretext – and killed 19 militants.
In Khan Younis, the evacuation order covered districts in the centre, east and west, making it one of the largest such displacements in the 10-month-old conflict, two days after tanks returned to the east of the city.
The announcement was posted on social media platform X and in text and audio messages to residents’ phones: “For your own safety, you must evacuate immediately to the newly created humanitarian zone. The area you are in is considered a dangerous combat zone.”
Mr Philippe Lazzarini, head of UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA, said people in Gaza were trapped and had nowhere else to go.
“Some are only able to carry their children with them. Some carry their whole lives in one small bag. They are going to overcrowded places where shelters are already overflowing with families. They have lost everything and need everything,” he said.
The Israeli army said on Aug 11 that it struck around 30 Hamas military targets in the previous 24 hours, including military structures, anti-tank missile launch posts and weapons storage facilities.
The Islamic Jihad’s armed wing said its fighters fired mortar bombs against Israeli forces massing in the eastern areas of Khan Younis.
Later on Aug 11, an Israeli air strike near the Khan Younis market at the centre of the city killed four Palestinians and wounded several others.
Lines of smoke rose from areas where Israeli planes carried out attacks in the eastern and western parts of the city. Residents said two multi-floor buildings were bombed.
Most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced from their homes, while their narrow strip of land has largely been reduced to a wasteland of rubble.
Palestinian and UN officials say there are no safe areas in the enclave. Areas designated as humanitarian zones, like Al-Mawasi in western Khan Younis where residents were being sent, have been bombed several times by Israeli forces.
A man carrying the body of a child killed in an Israeli air strike on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza City on Aug 10.
PHOTO: AFP
Tens of thousands left their homes and shelters in the middle of the night, heading west toward Mawasi and north towards Deir Al-Balah, areas already overcrowded with hundreds of thousands of displaced people.
“We’re exhausted. This is the 10th time I and my family have had to leave our shelter,” said Mr Zaki Mohammad, 28, who lives in the Hamad housing project in western Khan Younis, where the occupants of two multi-floor buildings were ordered to leave.
“People are carrying their belongings, their children, their hopes and their fears and running towards the unknown, because there is no safe place,” he told Reuters via a chat app. “We are running from death to death.”
Israel launched its assault on Gaza after Hamas fighters stormed into southern Israel on Oct 7
Since then, nearly 40,000 people have been killed in the Israeli offensive in Gaza.
Gaza health officials say most of the fatalities have been civilians, but Israel says at least a third are fighters.
Israel says it has lost 329 soldiers in Gaza. REUTERS
