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UN raps Israel’s deadly air strikes in northern Gaza
“This follows weeks of intensified operations resulting in scores of civilian fatalities and near total lack of humanitarian aid reaching populations in the north,” said Tor Wennesland, the UN Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.
Israel’s military said it intensified attacks in northern Gaza in early October to prevent Hamas from regrouping.
A total of 87 people were killed or missing under the rubble after an Israeli attack on Saturday on Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, the Gaza health ministry said on Sunday.
“Victims are still under the rubble and on the road and ambulance teams and civil emergency can’t reach them,” the ministry said in a statement.
The strike came two weeks into an Israel’s major operation around the town of Jabalia, just to the south of Beit Lahiya.
Evacuation orders, directing people south, have fueled fears among many Palestinians that the operation is intended to clear them out of the northern part of Gaza in order to help ensure Israeli control of the area after the war.
More than 42,600 Palestinians have been killed during Israel’s offensive and thousands more are thought to be buried under the rubble. Much of the coastal enclave has been destroyed and most of its 2.3 million population has been displaced.
As the fighting has continued, health officials have reported stark shortages of food, fuel and medical supplies to treat patients in the three remaining hospitals still partially operating in the area.