The Israeli military on Saturday stepped up its bombing of Gaza Strip, intensifying its renewed bombing on the second day after a truce between Israel and Hamas collapsed, with Israel accusing Hamas of violating the terms of the agreement.
The Israel Defense Forces IDF said on X on Saturday that Israeli strikes hit a total of over 400 terrorist targets in Gaza, including more than 50 targets in the area of Khan Yunis and an Islamic Jihad operational command center inside a mosque, as well as military targets used by Hamas Naval Force.
The BBC reported that hundreds of Gaza residents were seen leaving to the western part of Khan Yunis after the Israeli army on Friday dropped leaflets over the area warning people to leave.
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo earlier Saturday said he had spoken with Israel’s president following the resumption of fighting in Gaza and told him there could be no more killing of civilians. “I’ve addressed my concerns about the fact that violence has started again and I’ve again repeated what I said at the Rafah gate: no more civilian killings,” De Croo told reporters at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai, according to a Reuters report.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog on Friday skipped a speech he was scheduled to give at the COP28 meeting and accused Hamas of “blatantly” violating the truce. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on his X account that the fight against Hamas will continue “until we achieve all our goals: the return of all our abductees, the elimination of Hamas, and the promise that Gaza will never be a threat to Israel again.”
Hamas launched a violent attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip on October 7, killing at least 1,200 people and taking hundreds of hostages. Since then, Israel has been carrying out retaliatory strikes on the besieged enclave, killing more than 11,000 Palestinians, according to both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry.
