Local health authorities said Israeli forces killed at least 18 people in attacks and shootings on Sunday, including 13 people trying to get food near an aid distribution point in the central Gaza Strip and at least two in a house in Gaza.
The Israeli military spokesman's office said they were reviewing the reports.
Residents of Sheikh Radwan, one of Gaza's largest settlements, said the area came under Israeli tank shelling and airstrikes throughout Saturday and Sunday, forcing families to seek shelter in western parts of the city.
Israel's military has gradually escalated its operations around Gaza over the past three weeks, and on Friday ended temporary pauses in the area that had allowed aid deliveries, labeling it a "dangerous combat zone".
"They are crawling into the heart of the city where hundreds of thousands of people are hiding, from the east, north and south, while bombing these areas from the air and from the ground to scare people and make them leave," said Rezik Salah, a father of two, from Sheikh Radwan.
An Israeli official said Netanyahu's security cabinet would meet Sunday night to discuss the next stages of a planned offensive to capture Gaza City, which he described as Hamas' last stronghold.
A full-scale offensive is not expected to begin for weeks. Israel says it wants to evacuate civilians before bringing in more ground forces. On Saturday, Red Cross chief Mirjana Špoljarić said an evacuation of the city would cause a mass displacement of the population that no other area in the Gaza Strip is capable of absorbing, amid severe shortages of food, shelter and medical supplies.
“People who have relatives in the south have gone to stay with them. Others, including me, have not found a place because Deir Al-Balah and Mawasi are overcrowded,” said Ghada, a mother of five from the city’s Sabra neighborhood. About half of the enclave’s more than 2 million residents are currently in Gaza City. It is estimated that several thousand have left the city for the central and southern areas of the enclave, according to local sources.
Israel's military has warned its political leaders that the offensive threatens hostages still held by Hamas in Gaza. Protests in Israel calling for an end to the war and the release of the hostages have intensified in recent weeks.
Large crowds demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Saturday night, and families of the hostages protested outside the homes of ministers on Sunday morning. Twenty of the remaining 48 hostages are believed to be still alive.
Following a Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, which killed around 1200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 hostages, the Israeli military's attacks on Gaza killed more than 63,000 people, mostly civilians, according to medical sources in Gaza, plunging the enclave into a humanitarian disaster and leaving much of it in ruins.
Photo: EPA/MOHAMMED SABER
