Dozens feared dead in Gaza after Israeli attacks

Dozens of people have been killed or missing after Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip, a hospital director and the civil defense agency said Thursday.

An attack on a residential area near the area’s Kamal Adwan Hospital left “dozens of people” dead or missing, the facility’s director Hossam Abu Safiya told AFP.

The process of retrieving the bodies and injured persons continues, he said, adding: “Bodies are arriving at the hospital in pieces.”

Another attack was reported in a neighborhood of Gaza City.

“We can confirm that 22 martyrs were transferred (to hospital) after an attack targeted a house” in Sheikh Radwan district, civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.

Since Hamas carried out its October 7, 2023, attack, the deadliest in Israeli history, Israel has been waging a war in Gaza, which the militant group rules.

It promises to crush Hamas and bring home the hostages the group captured during the attack.

Israel is also fighting Hamas ally Hezbollah in Lebanon. Both groups are supported by Israel’s arch-enemy Iran.

On Thursday, US envoy Amos Hochstein will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to seek a truce in the war in Lebanon.

Hochstein’s meetings in Lebanon this week appeared to indicate some progress in efforts to end that war.

On the Gaza front, the United States on Wednesday vetoed a UN Security Council plea for a ceasefire, which Washington said would have emboldened Hamas.

Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7 resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

The Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said the death toll from the resulting war has reached 43,985 people, the majority of them civilians. The United Nations considers the figures reliable.

– ‘Freedom to act’ –

In October last year, Hezbollah began cross-border attacks on Israel in support of its ally Hamas.

In late September, Israel expanded the focus of its war from Gaza to Lebanon, pledging to fight Hezbollah until tens of thousands of Israelis displaced by the cross-border fire could return home.

With Hochstein in Lebanon, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Wednesday that a ceasefire agreement should ensure Israel still has the “freedom to act” against Hezbollah.

In a defiant speech, Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem threatened to attack Israel’s commercial center Tel Aviv in retaliation for attacks on Lebanon’s capital.

“Israel cannot defeat us and cannot impose its conditions on us,” Qassem said in his televised address.

In Lebanon, Hochstein met with officials including parliament speaker Nabih Berri, an ally of Hezbollah.

On Tuesday, Hochstein said the end of the war was “within our reach,” and on Wednesday he said the talks had “made additional progress.”

Since expanding its operations from Gaza to Lebanon in September, Israel has carried out extensive bombing, mainly targeting Hezbollah strongholds.

More than 3,544 people have been killed in Lebanon since the clashes began, according to authorities, most since the end of September. According to the United Nations, among them were more than 200 children.

Israel has also recently intensified attacks on neighboring Syria, the main arms channel for Hezbollah from its supporter Iran.

In the latest attack, a Syrian war monitor said 71 pro-Iranian fighters were killed in attacks on Palmyra in the country’s east.

Those killed in Wednesday’s attacks included 45 fighters from pro-Iranian Syrian groups, 26 foreign fighters, most from Iraq, and four from Lebanese Hezbollah, the monitor said.

Israel rarely comments on individual attacks in Syria but has repeatedly said it will not allow Iran to expand its presence in the country.

– Fighting in South Lebanon –

On Thursday, Lebanon’s official National News Agency said attacks hit the southern outskirts of Beirut, Hezbollah’s main bastion, following an evacuation call from the Israeli army.

Southern Lebanon was also hit by attacks, including the border town of Khiam, where Israeli forces are trying to advance, the agency said.

On Wednesday, Israel said three soldiers had been killed in fighting in southern Lebanon – bringing the total to 52 since the start of ground operations on September 30.

The Lebanese army said Israeli fire killed one of its soldiers in the area after it announced the deaths of three other personnel in an attack.

Although the Lebanese army is not involved in the ongoing war, it has suffered eighteen losses since the escalation began on September 23.

The Israeli military later said, without naming the dead, that it was investigating reports of Lebanese soldiers being injured in an attack on Tuesday.

“We emphasize that the (Israeli army) is operating precisely against the terrorist organization Hezbollah and not against the Lebanese forces,” the army told AFP in a statement.

Hezbollah was the only armed group in Lebanon that did not surrender its weapons after the 1975-1990 civil war.

It has maintained a formidable arsenal and has influence not only on the battlefield but also in Lebanese politics.

The United States, Israel’s main military and political backer, has insisted that the UN Security Council resolution that ended the last war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006 would provide the basis for a new ceasefire.

According to Resolution 1701, Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers should be the only forces deployed in southern Lebanon.