Ten thousand Palestinians flee homes and 132 dead as Israel-Gaza crisis escalates – World News
Israeli airstrikes in Gaza and rocket attacks from Hamas have continued into a fifth night with at least 132 people now killed and almost 1,000 injured.
The UN estimates that 10,000 Palestinians have been forced to flee their homes for safety as the assault from Israel goes on, with the militant group firing thousands of rockets at Israeli cities.
Eight people have been killed in Israel, authorities say, including a soldier and two children.
US and Arab diplomats are continuing to seek an end to the violence as the situation continues to spiral, claiming the lives of 32 children so far according to Palestinian medical officials.
Thousands of Palestinian families have taken shelter in UN run schools in northern Gaza.
At least four people were killed in one of several airstrikes in northern Gaza, said Palestinian officials, while residents said Israeli naval boats had fired shells from the Mediterranean.
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Israeli planes destroyed a mosque, according to the Palestinian religious affairs ministry.
Sirens sounded in two major southern Israeli cities warning of incoming fire from Gaza with Hamas claiming responsibility for launching rockets.
With no sign of an end to the fighting, Palestinians reported 11 killed in the occupied West Bank amid clashes between protesters and Israeli security forces.
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Hamas said a woman and a boy were among the four people killed in an Israeli air strike that hit a home belonging to the Abu Hattab family in Gaza City’s Beach refugee camp.
The Israeli army has not yet commented on the strike.
Among eight dead in Israel were a soldier patrolling the Gaza border and six civilians, including two children, Israeli authorities said.
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The UN Security Council is due to discuss the deepening crisis on Sunday.
Israel launched day-long attacks on Friday to destroy what it said were several miles of tunnels, launch sites and weapons manufacturing warehouses used by the militants in an effort to halt the rocket attacks.
Across central and southern Israel, from small towns bordering Gaza to metropolitan Tel Aviv and southern Beersheba, people have adjusted to sirens wailing, radio and TV broadcast interruptions and the beeps of cellphones bearing red alerts that send them rushing for cover.
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Cross-border hostilities between Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza have been accompanied by violence in mixed communities of Jews and Arabs in Israel.
Synagogues have been attacked and street fights have broken out, prompting Israel’s president to warn of civil war.
Egypt was leading regional efforts for a ceasefire with Cairo leaning on Hamas and others, including the United States, trying to reach an agreement with Israel.
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The foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan discussed efforts to end the Gaza confrontation and to prevent “provocations” in Jerusalem, Egypt’s foreign ministry said.
“The talks have taken a real and serious path on Friday,” a Palestinian official said. “The mediators from Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations are stepping up their contacts with all sides in a bid to restore calm, but a deal hasn’t yet been reached.”
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Hamas launched the rocket attacks on Monday, in retaliation for Israeli police clashes with Palestinians near al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site, in East Jerusalem.
The Israeli military said more than 2,000 rockets had been fired from Gaza into Israel since the start of the conflict, around half of them intercepted by missile defence system and 350 falling into the Gaza Strip.
