GAZA - Israel’s forces bombarded targets across Gaza on Jan 15, ahead of an expected announcement by Hamas on the fate of three Israelis held hostage by the Palestinian militant group shown in a video clip at the weekend.

Twelve Palestinians were killed and others wounded in an Israeli air strike overnight on a house in Gaza City in the north, health officials said, while plumes of smoke rose above the main southern city of Khan Younis shelled by Israeli tanks.

Hamas-affiliated Palestinian Press Agency Safa reported fierce clashes between the group’s fighters and Israeli forces in Khan Younis, while Israeli tank barrages were also reported near the Al-Bureij and Al-Maghazi refugee camps in central Gaza.

In Al-Nusseirat refugee camp, local journalist Doaa El-Baz showed footage of what was once the street where she lived.

“This whole neighbourhood is destroyed. Not a single house has been spared,” she said, standing before mounds of rubble. “They killed all our dreams here.”

In a statement, the Israeli military said it killed two Palestinian fighters in an air strike on their vehicle which was transporting weapons in southern Khan Younis, and also raided a Hamas command centre in the city and attacked two arms caches.

Separately, a Palestinian stole a car and rammed people in the central Israeli town of Raanana on Jan 15, injuring at least 13, police said. The suspect – believed to be from Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – was taken into custody, they said.

Israeli media said some people might have also been stabbed in the incident.

Communications across the narrow coastal Gaza Strip remained severed for a fourth consecutive day, residents said.

The three Israeli hostages are among some 240 seized by Islamist Hamas militants during a surprise cross-border rampage into southern Israel on Oct 7.

That Hamas assault, in which Israel says more than 1,200 people were killed, prompted an aerial and ground blitz by Israeli forces that over 100 days since has turned much of Gaza into a wasteland and killed, health officials say, some 24,100 people and wounded nearly 61,000.

Health officials said 132 people were killed in the past 24 hours, suggesting to Palestinians that there has been little let-up in the intensity of Israel’s offensive despite its announcement of a shift to a new, more targeted phase.

Israel’s military has said it will devote months of more targeted operations against the leaders and positions of Hamas in south Gaza after an initial all-out offensive centred on clearing the heavily built-up northern end of the Strip.

Hostages

Hamas aired a video on Jan 14 showing three Israeli hostages it is holding in Gaza and urged the Israeli government to halt its aerial and ground offensive and bring about their release.

The undated 37-second video of Ms Noa Argamani, 26, Mr Yossi Sharabi, 53, and Mr Itai Svirsky, 38, ended with the caption: “Tomorrow (Jan 15) we will inform you of their fate.”

On Jan 15, maintaining the psychological pressure, Hamas released a video clip featuring the faces of the three hostages and the question: “What do you think?”

The clip then offers three options – one in which all three are killed, another where “some are killed, some are injured”, or the third, where all three are spared. The video ends with the message: “Tonight we will inform you of their fate.”

Around half of the 240 hostages that Hamas took in October were released during a short-lived November truce, but Israel says 132 remain in Gaza and that 25 have died in captivity.

Meanwhile, almost two million displaced people are sheltering in tents and other temporary accommodation in southern Gaza amid the fighting, and are facing increased risks of starvation and disease due to chronic shortages of food, fuel and medicines.

United Nations agencies renewed their appeal on Jan 15 for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.

“We need unimpeded, safe access to deliver aid and a humanitarian ceasefire to prevent further death and suffering,” said World Health Organisation chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, adding that hunger would further harm the sick and make “an already terrible situation catastrophic”.

A video clip circulating on social media showed crowds of people running beside UN vehicles on a beach in Gaza City hoping to get some aid. People were then shown carrying away bags of flour.

Reuters was able to verify the location shown in the clip, but not the date it was filmed.

Houthis

With fears growing of a wider conflict in the Middle East, the US military said on Jan 14 its fighter aircraft shot down an anti-ship cruise missile fired from Houthi militant areas of Yemen towards a United States destroyer operating in the southern Red Sea.

The midair interception was the latest incident in the Red Sea, where the Houthis have been attacking international shipping in what they say is a campaign to support Palestinians under siege from Israeli forces in Gaza.

It follows a series of American and British airstrikes on Houthi targets in Yemen last week that have drawn threats of a “strong” response from the Iranian-backed militia.

The Houthis’ chief negotiator, Mr Mohammed Abdulsalam, told Reuters on Jan 15 that the group’s attacks on shipping would continue until Israel halts its offensive in Gaza and humanitarian aid is allowed to flow freely into the Strip. REUTERS