CAIRO: Israeli military strikes killed at least 23 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, most of them in the town of Beit Lahiya on the northern edge, medics said, as the army issued new evacuation orders in the south of the small enclave.

Medics said eight people had been killed in a series of airstrikes in Beit Lahiya while four others were killed elsewhere in Gaza City.

An Israeli airstrike later killed two people and wounded others in Jabalia, the largest of Gaza’s eight historic refugee camps, in the coastal enclave’s north, medics said.

Another air attack, on Al-Falah School sheltering displaced families in Gaza City’s Zeitoun suburb, killed six people and wounded others, medics said, while in Rafah in the far south, three women were killed by Israeli drone fire, they added.

Death toll increases to 44,502 in Gaza, 105,454 injured

The Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said its operations in Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun had now been halted for nearly four weeks due to Israeli attacks on their teams as well as fuel shortages.

On Tuesday it said 13 of 27 vehicles in central and southern Gaza were also stuck for lack of fuel. It said 88 members of the Civil Emergency Service had been killed, 304 wounded and 21 detained by Israel since the war began in October 2023.

At least 44,502 Palestinians have been killed and 105,454 injured since the start of Israel’s military offensive on Oct 7, 2023, Gaza’s health ministry said on Tuesday.

Evacuation orders

The Israeli army issued evacuation orders on Tuesday to residents in northern districts of Khan Yunis, a city in south Gaza, citing the firing of rockets by militants from those areas. The orders, the latest of many, prompted the hurried exodus of families, mostly before dawn, in a westerly direction.

“For your own safety, you must evacuate the area immediately and move to the humanitarian zone,” the army said in a statement on X.

Hamas-Fatah agreement

Meanwhile, Hamas and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas’s Fatah party have agreed to create a committee to jointly administer post-war Gaza, negotiators from both sides said on Tuesday.

Under the plan, which needs Mr Abbas’s approval, the committee would be composed of 10 to 15 non-partisan figures with authority on matters related to the economy, education, health, humanitarian aid and reconstruction, according to a draft of the proposal seen by AFP.

Following talks in Cairo brokered by Egypt, the two rival Palestinian movements agreed the committee would administer the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt, the territory’s only one not shared with Israel.

Fatah’s delegation, led by central party committee member Azzam al-Ahmad, was scheduled to return to Ramallah on Tuesday to seek Mr Abbas’s final approval, the negotiators said on condition of anonymity. Hamas’s delegation was led by politburo member Khalil al-Hayya.

Israeli leaders applaud Trump pledge

Israeli leaders hailed on Tuesday a pledge by US President-elect Donald Trump that there would be “hell to pay” in the Middle East unless prisoners held in the Gaza Strip were released ahead of his Jan 20 inauguration.

Writing on Truth Social, and without naming any group, Trump said the prisoners had to be freed by the time he was sworn in.

If his demand was not met, he said: “Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and many of his ministers publicly thanked Trump for his hard-hitting words.

“President Trump put the emphasis in the right place, on Hamas, and not on the Israeli government, as is customary (elsewhere),” Netan­yahu said at the start of a cabinet meeting.

Published in Dawn, December 4th, 2024