23 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes

Rescuers in Gaza said 23 people were killed and several more wounded in Israeli air strikes across the Palestinian territory yesterday.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said five people were killed in a strike on a home in Jabalia, in the north.

Two more people, including a pregnant woman, were killed in an attack targeting tents sheltering displaced people around Nuseirat in central Gaza, he added. A strike in the main southern city of Khan Yunis also killed one person, Bassal said.

The Israeli military has stepped up its Gaza operations in recent days in what it has described as a renewed push to destroy Hamas, reports AFP.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Saturday that an Israeli strike in the southern city of Khan Yunis killed nine children of a pair of married doctors, with the Israeli army saying it was reviewing the reports.

World Food Programme (WFP) warned that four-year-old Mohammed Yassine died from a lack of food as more than 70,000 children in Gaza face acute levels of malnutrition, reports Al Jazeera online.

The Israeli army had issued an evacuation warning for Khan Yunis today.

In Jabalia, rescuers said local journalist Hassan Majdi Abu Warda and several family members were killed by an airstrike that hit his house earlier yesterday, reports Reuters.

The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said that Abu Warda's death raised the number of Palestinian journalists killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023, to 220.

The armed wing of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad said in separate statements yesterday that fighters carried out several ambushes and attacks using bombs and anti-tank rockets against Israeli forces operating in several areas across Gaza.

Gaza's health ministry said Saturday that at least 3,747 people had been killed in the territory since a ceasefire collapsed on March 18, taking the war's overall toll to 53,901, mostly civilians.

On Friday the Israeli military said it had conducted more strikes in Gaza overnight, hitting 75 targets including weapons storage facilities and rocket launchers.

Meanwhile, Malaysia's foreign minister yesterday condemned "atrocities" in Gaza, saying they reflected "indifference and double standards" on the plight of the Palestinian people.

"They are a direct result of the erosion of the sanctity of international law," Mohamad Hasan told his counterparts from the regional Asean bloc.