At least 22 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes in Gaza on Saturday, medics said, while the Israeli military said it targeted gunmen operating from shelters and aid depots. At least 10 people were killed in an airstrike near a municipal building in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, where people had gathered to seek aid, medics said.
Doctors said that the injured were taken to the hospital on foot, in rickshaws and in private cars. Hamas has killed Diab Ali al-Jarru, head of the Hamas-run administrative committee in central Gaza, according to a Hamas source.
The Israeli military said al-Jarou, who was also the mayor of Deir al-Balah, was the target of the attack and that he had supported Hamas fighters. Four more people were killed in separate attacks in the area.
Earlier, Israeli aircraft struck a terrorist and weapons cache near an aid warehouse, the military said, after gunmen fired rockets into Israel from there on Friday. Another rocket was fired into Israel from Gaza on Saturday, the military said.
A separate strike on a former shelter housing displaced people in Gaza City targeted Hamas fighters, the military said. Palestinian medics said at least seven people were killed in the attack, including a woman and her child. Reuters It could not be confirmed if any of the dead were militants. Hamas does not disclose its casualties, and the Palestinian Health Ministry does not distinguish between the daily death toll between combatants and non-combatants.
The Israeli military said it was taking precautions to minimize the risk of civilian casualties.
The journalist was killed
Mohammed Balousa, a local journalist working for Dubai Al Mashad Television, was killed in a separate airstrike in Gaza City, health officials said. The Army was looking into the report, a spokesman said. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 137 journalists and journalists have been killed in the more than a year of war in Gaza.
The war began after Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing 1,200, mostly civilians, and returning more than 250 hostages to Gaza, according to Israeli officials.
Israel then launched an air, sea and land offensive that has killed nearly 45,000 people, most of them civilians, according to officials in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, displaced nearly the entire population and left much of the enclave in ruins.
Efforts to reach a ceasefire by Egypt, Qatar and the United States have gained momentum in recent weeks.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi held talks with US officials on Saturday to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and a deal for hostages in the Palestinian enclave, Sisi’s office said.
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