Tens of thousands flee Gaza overnight as Israel orders more evacuations

CAIRO:Israel expanded evacuation orders in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip overnight, forcing tens of thousands of Palestinian residents and displaced families to leave in the dark as explosions from tank shelling reverberated around them.

The Israeli military said it was hitting terrorists from the Hamas organization, which formerly ruled Gaza, who were exploiting the locations to conduct assaults and fire rockets.

According to the civil defense agency, an Israeli attack on a school where displaced Palestinians were refuge in Gaza City killed at least 90 people on Saturday, sparking international outrage.

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The Israeli military claimed it had attacked a Hamas and Islamic Jihad militant command headquarters, which the two groups denied as a pretext, killing 19 militants.

The evacuation order in Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip, covers districts in the center, east, and west, making it one of the largest such orders in the 10-month-old conflict, just two days after tanks returned to the city’s east.

The notification was put on X and sent as text and voice messages to residents’ phones: “For your own safety, you must evacuate immediately to the newly established humanitarian zone.” “The area you’re in is considered a dangerous combat zone.”

Philippe Lazzarini, chief of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), said Palestinians in Gaza were stuck and had nowhere to flee.

“Some can just bring their children with them, while others may carry their entire life in a single tiny bag. They are traveling to congested areas where shelters are already full of families. “They’ve lost everything and need everything,” he explained.

The Israeli army reported that it had targeted around 30 Hamas military targets in the preceding 24 hours, including military installations, anti-tank missile launch positions, and weapons storage facilities.

According to the Islamic Jihad armed wing, gunmen launched mortar shells toward Israeli soldiers stationed in Khan Younis’ eastern districts.

Later on Sunday, an Israeli bombing near the Khan Younis market in the city center killed four Palestinians and wounded numerous more, according to medics.

Lines of smoke erupted from sites where Israeli jets had launched assaults in the city’s east and west. Residents said that two multi-story structures were bombed.

Nearly 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s onslaught in Gaza since the conflict began in October, and the toll is climbing by the day, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

According to Gaza health officials, the majority of those killed were civilians, however Israel claims at least one-third were combatants. Israel claims it has lost 329 troops in Gaza.

Israel launched its attack on Gaza after Hamas fighters surged into southern Israel on October 7, murdering 1,200 people, primarily civilians, and kidnapping more than 250 prisoners, according to Israeli estimates.

According to the United Nations, the majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents have been driven from their homes, and the thin strip of land has been virtually reduced to rubble.

According to Palestinian and UN authorities, the enclave lacks safe spaces. Israeli troops have struck designated humanitarian zones multiple times, including Al-Mawasi in western Khan Younis, where civilians were being transported.

Tens of thousands abandoned their houses and shelters in the middle of the night, traveling west toward Mawasi and north into Deir Al-Balah, which was already packed with hundreds of thousands of displaced people.

“We are fatigued. This is the tenth time my family and I have had to leave our home,” said Zaki Mohammad, 28, who lives in the Hamad housing complex in western Khan Younis. The tenants of two multi-floor buildings were asked to evacuate.

“People are carrying their belongings, their children, their hopes and their fears and running towards the unknown, because there is no safe place,” he told Reuters using an app that allowed him to communicate. “We’re rushing from death to death.