Palestinians gather for Iftar amid the ruins of their destroyed homes in Beit Lahia, Northern Gaza, on 15 March [Getty]
Israeli military strikes have killed at least 15 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, the enclave’s health ministry said on Sunday, as Arab and US mediators work to shore up a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Palestinian officials say dozens of people have been killed by Israeli fire despite the 19 January truce that halted large-scale fighting in Gaza.
Gaza’s health ministry said most of the latest deaths were on Saturday when an Israeli airstrike killed nine Palestinians including four journalists in the town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip.
A number of the dead were aid workers working the Al-Khair Foundation, a UK-registered charity.
The foundation said that seven humanitarian workers were killed in the Israeli strike, which targeted one of their vehicles. Two of the dead were photographers who were documenting their work.
The Israeli military claimed six of the men were members of the armed wings of Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad militant group.
Salama Marouf, the head of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, said the military’s statement about the incident included the names of people who were not present.
It was based on inaccurate social media reports “without even bothering to verify the facts”, Marouf said.
At least four more Palestinians were killed in separate Israeli strikes on Saturday, the Gaza health officials said.
An Israeli drone had fired a missile at a group of Palestinians in the town of Juhr Eldeek in central Gaza on Sunday, killing a 62-year-old man and wounding several others, the medics said. Several others were hurt when an Israeli drone fired a missile towards a group of people in Rafah, they added.
The Israeli military said it was not familiar with the reported drone strikes.
Later on Sunday, an Israeli airstrike killed a Palestinian near the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City, medics said. The Israeli military said in a statement it struck a “terrorist” attempting to plant a bomb on the ground.
Ceasefire talks
Persistent bloodshed in Gaza underscores the fragility of the three-stage ceasefire agreement mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the US, which have stepped in to hammer out a deal between Israel and Hamas over how to proceed.
Israel wants to extend the ceasefire’s first phase, a proposal backed by US envoy Steve Witkoff. Hamas says it will resume freeing hostages only under the second phase that was due to begin on 2 March.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Saturday negotiators had been instructed to be ready to continue talks based on the mediators’ response to a US proposal for the release of 11 living hostages and half of the dead captives.
Hamas on Friday said it had agreed to release American-Israeli soldier Edan Alexander and four bodies of the hostages if Israel agreed to begin talks immediately on implementing the second phase of the agreement. Israel accused Hamas of waging “psychological warfare” on the families of hostages.
An Israeli delegation was in Egypt discussing a possible deal with senior Egyptian officials that would release more hostages, Netanyahu’s office said on Sunday.
Israel’s assault on Gaza has killed more than 48,500 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials, displaced most of the population and reduced much of the territory to rubble.
(Reuters)
