An Israeli airstrike near a market in Gaza City killed nearly two dozen Palestinians on Wednesday, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense rescue service.
The civil defense said six women and nine children were among at least 22 dead in the attack near Firas Market on the eastern side of the city. The Wafa news agency, which is linked to the Palestinian Authority administration in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, said all of those killed were seeking shelter in a warehouse that was hit by the strike.
An Israeli military statement said the strike had hit “two Hamas terrorists in the northern Gaza Strip,” without providing further details about who they were. It went on to say the number of casualties reported “does not align with the information” obtained by the Israeli military. But it did not say how many people it believed had been killed in the strike.
Israel has said it launched the ground invasion of Gaza City last week to root out the Palestinian militant group Hamas from one of its last strongholds. Hamas led the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that ignited the Gaza war. The Israeli military has said that its operations in Gaza target militants and the infrastructure they use to mount attacks, such as weapons caches or tunnels, and that those targets are often located in civilian areas.
Israel has come under growing international pressure recently for escalating the war with the ground invasion of Gaza City, the territory’s largest urban center. The operation has already displaced hundreds of thousands of people, many of whom have been displaced before in the war, and deepened a humanitarian catastrophe across the Gaza Strip.
In the past few days, almost a dozen countries have expressed their frustration with the conflict by formally recognizing a Palestinian state, angering Israeli officials.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Already a subscriber? Log in.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The post Israeli Strike on Gaza City Kills Civilians, Local Rescue Service Says appeared first on New York Times.
