GAZA STRIP: Under intense bombing on Thursday, Palestinians evacuated eastern Gaza City after the Israeli military issued an evacuation order for the region, which it had earlier determined to be free of Hamas members.
The flare-up in the Shujaiya neighborhood in the northern Gaza Strip, which witnesses and medical personnel reported resulted in multiple casualties, coincides with growing concerns about a broader regional conflict involving Israel and Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas.
During a visit to Washington, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant cautioned Hezbollah that large-scale violence would return Lebanon “back to the stone age” over the Gaza conflict and strategies to prevent wider conflict in the Middle East.
As Israel and Hezbollah’s cross-border tensions increase, Gallant stated, “We do not want war, but we are preparing for every scenario.” Despite remarks made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the conflict, which is approaching its tenth month, was coming to an end, combat has continued in Gaza.
Growing concerns about a regional conflict prompt Tel Aviv to warn that it may drive Lebanon “back to Stone Age.”
Israeli strikes overnight and early on Thursday killed at least five people in Gaza City and another in Beit Lahia, also in the north, according to the civil defense service in the Hamas-run enclave and medics.
“Terrorists who were in a school complex in Khan Yunis,” according to the Israeli military, were attacked in the south.
As Israeli military vehicles neared the neighborhood in the midst of airstrikes and shelling, a witness in Shujaiya, Gaza City, who wished to remain anonymous, described the situation as “very difficult and frightening.”
“Mortals and wounded lie in the streets, residents are running through the streets in terror.”
In a message shared on social media, Avichay Adraee, the Israeli military’s Arabic-speaking spokeswoman, advised locals and displaced Gazaans in the Shujaiya neighborhood to evacuate “for your safety.”
They were instructed to travel 25 kilometers south to a designated “humanitarian zone.” A photographer observed a large number of people departing on foot through streets littered with debris, carrying their possessions.
“Notable displacement”
At the Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City, Muhammad Ghurab, a physician, reported that seven “martyrs including four children” and more than forty wounded people had been admitted to the facility thus far “as the Israeli forces advanced to the east of Shujaiya neighborhood.”
“A significant displacement of residents” in the vicinity of Shujaiya market was reported by Hamas’ news office. Omar Sukar, a resident of Shujaiya, stated that the violence started while Gazans were gathering drinking water, which has been scarce owing to an Israeli embargo. He reported that “people were filling water in the Shabura area in Shujaiya.”
