GAZA CITY: Dozens of Israeli air strikes on Gaza have killed “only women and children” after a ceasefire collapsed, the UN said, as an Israeli attack in the territory’s south on Friday left a family of 10 dead.

A UN rights office report also warned that expanding Israeli evacuation orders were resulting in the “forcible transfer” of people into ever-shrinking areas, raising “real concern as to the future viability of Palestinians as a group in Gaza”.

The United Nations’ human rights office warned that Israel’s actions in Gaza were increasingly endangering the very existence of Palestinians as a group.

“In light of the cumulative impact of Israeli forces conduct in Gaza, we are seriously concerned that Israel appears to be inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life increasingly incompatible with their continued existence as a group,” Ravina Shamdasani, the spokesperson for the office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights told reporters in Geneva on Friday.

While Israel resumed its Gaza strikes on March 18, ending a two-month ceasefire with Hamas, Israel’s military about the latest strikes said it was looking into the attack that killed members of the same family in Khan Yunis.

UN rights office warns Israel’s actions in Gaza threaten very existence of Palestinians

“Ten people, including seven children, were brought to the hospital as martyrs following an Israeli air strike that targeted the Farra family home in central Khan Yunis,” civil defence spokesperson Mahmud Bassal said.

Footage of the aftermath showed several bodies wrapped in white shrouds and blankets, and footage of the house showed mangled concrete slabs and twisted metal.

Since March 18, more than 1,500 people have been killed by Israeli forces, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory to which Israel cut off aid more than a month ago.

‘Barbarism’

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan denounced Israel, saying: “If this is not barbarism, I ask you, what is it?”

The UN decried the impact of the ongoing Israeli strikes, finding that “a large percentage of fatalities are children and women”.

224 attacks in three weeks: UN

“Between March 18 and April 9, 2025, there were some 224 incidents of Israeli strikes on residential buildings and tents for internally displaced people,” the UN human rights office said in Geneva.

“In some 36 strikes about which the UN Human Rights Office corroborated information, the fatalities recorded so far were only women and children.”

UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani also raised concerns over “the denial of access to basic necessities within Gaza and the repeated suggestion that Gazans should leave the territory entirely”.

Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan, after meeting regional counterparts in Turkiye, urged “maximum pressure to ensure” aid is delivered into Gaza.

Gaza’s health ministry said at least 1,542 Palestinians have been killed since March 18, taking the overall death toll to 50,912 since October 2023 when the decades-old conflict intensified.

Ceasefire efforts

A two-month truce brokered on Jan 19 saw the return of 33 Israeli prisoners, eight of them in coffins, in exchange for around 1,800 Palestinian prisoners.

In a Passover holiday message, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his pledge to bring the remaining captives home. He spoke after Trump suggested progress in prisoners’ release talks, telling a cabinet meeting on Thursday that “we’re getting close to getting them back”.

Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff was also quoted in an Israeli media report as saying “a very serious deal is taking shape, it’s a matter of days”.

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2025