GAZA STRIP (AFP) – Israelis and Palestinians end a dark year yesterday, with no end in sight to the deadliest military offensive on Gaza.
There has been no respite from Israel’s air raids, artillery fire or ground fighting with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, to the despair of Palestinians surviving the onslaught.
“We were hoping that 2024 would arrive under better auspices and that we would be able to celebrate the new year at home with our families,” said Mahmoud Abou Shahma in a camp for displaced people in Rafah, on the Egyptian border.
“We hope that the war will end and that we will be able to return to our homes and live in peace,” said the 33-year-old from Khan Younis, an epicentre of the conflict in the south of Gaza.
Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said the Israeli military campaign murdered at least 21,672 people, mostly women and children – by far the heaviest death toll of any Israeli operation.
Yesterday the ministry reported numerous deaths in overnight strikes on central Gaza’s Zawayda and the nearby Al-Mughazi refugee camp.
An Israeli siege imposed after October 7, following years of crippling blockade, has led to dire shortages of food, safe water, fuel and medicine in Gaza, with aid convoys able to offer only sporadic relief. The United Nations (UN) said more than 85 per cent of Gaza’s 2.4 million people have fled their homes.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned of the growing threat of infectious diseases and the UN said Gaza is “just weeks away” from famine.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday that Israel’s war against Hamas will last for “many months”.
“We will guarantee that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel,” he told a news conference.
As Netanyahu spoke, more than a thousand relatives and supporters of the hostages demonstrated in Tel Aviv to maintain pressure on his government to bring their loved ones home.
“I hope there’s going to be another deal, even a partial deal or some will be released. I’m trying to hold on to every shred of hope,” said Nir Shafran, 45.
In Khan Younis, medics at Nasser hospital described severe shortages.
“The hospital is receiving a lot more (patients) than its capacity,” doctor Ahmad Abu Mustafa said in footage shared by the WHO.
“The beds are full… and we are basically short on all sorts of medicine supplies.”
The fighting has put 23 hospitals and 53 health centres out of service, while 104 ambulances have been destroyed, the health ministry said.
In Zawayda, Palestinians pulled the body of a child from under the rubble on Saturday after an Israeli strike.
“We pulled (out) nine martyrs, who were members of a very peaceful family. Two adjacent houses were targeted,” said the area’s civil defence director, Rami al-Aidi.
