Israeli military strikes killed at least 22┬аPalestinians across the┬аGaza┬аStrip on Wednesday, as Israeli forces deepened their incursion into Beit Hanoun town in the north, forcing most┬аremaining residents┬аto leave.
Residents said Israeli forces besieged shelters housing displaced families and the remaining population, which some estimated at a few thousand, ordering them to head south through a checkpoint separating two towns and a refugee camp in the north from┬аGaza┬аCity.
Men were held for questioning, while women and children were allowed to continue toward┬аGaza┬аCity, residents and Palestinian medics said.
Israel’s campaign in the┬аnorth of┬аGaza, and the evacuation of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the area, has fuelled claims from Palestinians that it is clearing the area for use as a buffer zone and potentially for a return of Jewish settlers.
“The scenes of the 1948 catastrophe are being repeated. Israel is repeating its massacres, displacement and destruction,” said Saed, 48, a resident of Beit Lahiya, who arrived in┬аGaza┬аCity on Wednesday.
“North┬аGaza┬аis being turned into a large buffer zone, Israel is carrying out ethnic cleansing under the sight and hearing of the impotent world,” he told Reuters via a chat app.
Saed was referring to the 1948 Middle East Arab-Israeli war which gave birth to the state of Israel and saw the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their home towns and villages in what is now Israel.
The Israeli military has denied any such intention, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he does not want to reverse the 2005 withdrawal of settlers from┬аGaza. Hardliners in his government have talked openly about going back.
International aid groups say Israel has failed to meet a series of U.S. demands intended to improve the humanitarian crisis in Gaza by a Tuesday deadline. The U.S. said Israel could face restrictions on military aid if it did not improve the aid situation in Gaza.
It said forces have killed hundreds of Hamas militants in Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun during its new military offensive, which began more than a month ago. Hamas and the Islamic Jihad armed wing claimed killing several Israeli soldiers during ambushes and anti-tank rocket fire.
Ceasefire efforts fail to end war
Efforts by Arab mediators, Qatar and Egypt, backed by the United States, have so far failed to end the┬аwar in┬аGaza, with Hamas and Israel trading the blame for the lack of progress.
Speaking on Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Israel “has accomplished the goals that it set for itself” by taking out Hamas’ leadership and ensuring the group is unable to launch another massive attack. “This should be a time to end the war,” he said.
“We also need to make sure we have a plan for what follows,” he said, “so that if Israel decides to end the war and we find a way to get the hostages out, we also have a clear plan so that Israel can get out of┬аGaza┬аand we make sure that Hamas is not going back in.”
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said Blinken’s comments showed: “We are facing one enemy and that the U.S. enmity against the Palestinian people is no less than that of the occupation.”
On Tuesday, the┬аUnited States stressed┬аat the UN┬аthat “there must be no forcible displacement, nor policy of starvation in┬аGaza” by Israel, warning such policies would have grave implications under U.S. and international law.
Attacks across Gaza Strip continue
Medics said five people were killed in an Israeli strike that hit a group of people outside Kamal Adwan Hospital near Beit Lahiya, while five others were killed in two separate strikes in Nuseirat in central┬аGaza┬аStrip where the army began a limited raid two days ago.
In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, one man was killed and several others were wounded in an Israeli airstrike, while three Palestinians were killed in two separate Israeli airstrikes in Shejaia suburb of┬аGaza┬аCity, medics added.
Later on Wednesday, an Israeli strike on a house in western Khan Younis in the southern┬аGaza┬аStrip killed eight people, medics said.
Hamas-led gunmen attacked Israel last October, killing some 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 43,500 Palestinians have been killed in┬аGaza┬аover the past year, Palestinian health officials say, and much of Gaza┬аhas been reduced to a wasteland of wrecked buildings and piles of rubble, where more than two million┬аGazans are seeking shelter in makeshift tents and┬аfacing shortages┬аof food and medicines.
