KEY POINTS
- Eight killed in Israeli attack at school sheltering displaced families.
- Israeli strike on a house in central Gaza kills 13.
- Israel says far from reaching a prisoner swap deal with Hamas.
- Pope Slams ‘Cruelty’ of Israeli Strikes.
GAZA: Israeli military strikes across the Gaza Strip early Sunday killed at least 28 Palestinians, including at one family’s home and a school building, the Palestinian Defence rescue agency reported.
Palestinian medics said eight people, including children, were killed in the Musa Bin Nusayr School that sheltered displaced families in Gaza.
Israeli military has confirmed a separate strike further north, on a school in Gaza City. The Israeli military said it had carried out a “precise strike” overnight targeting Hamas positions.
Civil agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal in a statement said that at least 13 people were killed in an air strike on a house in central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah belonging to the Abu Samra family.
Bassal said a drone strike early on Sunday also hit a car in Gaza City, killing four people. Meanwhile, an overnight strike killed three people in Rafah, in the south.
Staggering Death Toll
Israel’s war in Gaza has so far killed at least 45,259 Palestinians and injured 107,627 others, the territory’s health ministry said on Sunday. In Lebanon, Israel has killed 4,048 people since October 2023 and keeps breaching the November 27 truce deal.
Indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas, mediated by Qatar, Egypt, and the United States, were held last week in Doha to reach a peace deal.
On Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed hope for a peace agreement but refrained from speculating on when it would be materialised.
Israeli officials, meanwhile, emphasised that the Israeli government is still far from finalising a prisoner swap deal with Hamas.
According to an Israeli state television KAN, unnamed Israeli officials shared their views on the ongoing negotiations for a prisoner swap.
The officials confirmed that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has no intention of stopping strikes on Gaza.
Pope Slams ‘Cruelty’ of Israeli Strikes
Pope Francis on Saturday condemned the Israeli bombing of children in Gaza as “cruelty”.
“Yesterday they did not allow the Patriarch (of Jerusalem) into Gaza as promised. Yesterday children were bombed. This is cruelty, this is not war,” Pope told members of the government of the Holy See.
“I want to say it because it touches my heart.”
Trapped in ‘Graveyard’
UNRWA Senior Emergency Officer Louise Wateridge warned on Friday that Gaza has become a “graveyard” as heavy winter rains, hunger, dire living conditions, and ongoing hostilities continue to endanger lives.
“An entire society here is now a graveyard … Over two million people are trapped,” she said, speaking from the Nuseirat camp.
UNRWA Senior Emergency Officer Louise Wateridge warned on Friday that Gaza has become a “graveyard” as heavy winter rains, hunger, dire living conditions, and ongoing hostilities continue to endanger lives.
