GAZA- Israeli airstrikes and artillery fire continued to pound the Gaza Strip on Monday, killing and injuring dozens of Palestinians across multiple areas, amid intensifying warnings from the United Nations that the ongoing blockade of humanitarian aid risks pushing more civilians to death by famine.
Since dawn, the Israeli army has launched heavy bombardments on eastern and northern Gaza in parallel with ongoing ground operations. Eyewitnesses reported hearing violent and successive explosions throughout the day.
Medical sources in Gaza confirmed that at least 24 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes across the enclave since early Monday. The escalation comes as the humanitarian situation deteriorates further under Israel’s suffocating siege, now in its 21st month.
In the north, six Palestinians, including an infant, were killed and dozens injured in an Israeli airstrike on a medical clinic sheltering displaced civilians in the center of Gaza City. Most of the victims were women and children, according to sources at the Shifa Medical Complex. The infant, who had been displaced with his family from eastern Gaza, was pronounced dead at the hospital. His parents remain missing under the rubble.
Near Rafah, emergency services reported that two Palestinians were killed and 20 others injured by Israeli fire near an aid center north of the city, one of the few remaining points where humanitarian aid is distributed. In Khan Younis, the Nasser Medical Complex said three people were killed in separate Israeli shellings in the center, west, and south of the city.
In the central Gaza Strip, an Israeli airstrike on a home belonging to the Al-Jadi family in the Al-Bureij refugee camp killed three Palestinians and wounded several others, according to medical teams at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah. The same hospital also reported four Palestinians seriously injured in an Israeli strike on a tent housing displaced people in Deir al-Balah city.
In Gaza City’s Tel al-Hawa neighborhood, Israeli shelling struck a residential apartment, killing one Palestinian and wounding several more, according to local witnesses and hospital officials.
The death toll continues to rise. Hospital sources report that since dawn Sunday, 82 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli airstrikes concentrated on Gaza City, Nuseirat refugee camp, and Khan Younis. Over the past 100 hours alone, the Israeli military has committed 59 massacres, killing 288 civilians, including 99 who were waiting for aid, and injuring 1,088 others.
The United Nations sounded a dire warning on Monday, stating that the Israeli blockade on aid, particularly food, is exacerbating famine in Gaza. “Blocking aid as famine intensifies in Gaza means more lives will be lost,” the UN said.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has waged a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, in violation of international law and despite binding orders from the International Court of Justice to halt its campaign. The war has killed or injured 189,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom are women and children. Over 11,000 remain missing, while hundreds of thousands are displaced across a devastated territory, many now facing mass starvation.
