Israel’s military yesterday ordered more areas in and around Gaza’s second-largest city of Khan Younis to evacuate, as it shifted its offensive to the southern half of the territory where it says many Hamas leaders are hiding.
Heavy bombardments were reported overnight and into yesterday in the area of Khan Younis and the southern city of Rafah, as well as parts of the north that had been the focus of Israel’s blistering air and ground campaign.
Many of the territory’s 2.3 million people are crammed in the south after Israeli forces ordered civilians to leave the north in the early days of the two-month-old war, sparked by an Oct. 7 attack by Hamas and other militants that killed about 1,200 people.
Photo: AFP
With the resumption of fighting, hopes receded that another temporary truce could be negotiated. A week-long ceasefire, which expired on Friday, had facilitated the release of dozens of Gaza-held Israeli and foreign hostages and Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.
“We will continue the war until we achieve all its goals, and it’s impossible to achieve those goals without the ground operation,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an address on Saturday night.
Since the ceasefire collapsed, Hamas has fired scores of rockets into Israel, setting off air raid sirens across southern and central areas. Most rockets are intercepted or fall in open areas, but the fire continues to disrupt life across wide swaths of Israel.
The Israeli military yesterday widened evacuation orders in and around Khan Younis, telling residents of at least five more areas and neighborhoods to leave for their safety. Several hundred thousand Palestinians have received evacuation orders since the fighting resumed but they have few places to go.
Residents said the Israeli military dropped leaflets ordering them to move south to Rafah or to a coastal area in the southwest.
“Khan Younis city is a dangerous combat zone,” the leaflets read.
UN monitors said in a report issued before the latest evacuation orders that those who were told to leave make up about one-quarter of the territory of Gaza — home to nearly 800,000 people before the war.
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