The Israeli army continues its advance in the Gaza Strip, where the Hamas government reported dozens of deaths from a new Israeli strike on a refugee camp despite calls for a ceasefire and despair among Palestinian civilians as thirty days have passed since the outbreak of the war. Israeli warplanes continued to bomb various sites in the Gaza Strip, resulting in a new massacre in the al-Maghazi camp that left dozens dead and over 100 injured, while hospitals and shelters for displaced persons were still being targeted.
Eyad al-Bazam, spokesperson for the Palestinian Ministry of Interior and National Security in Gaza, announced during a press conference that the death toll has risen to more than 37,000. Al-Bazam stated, "The Ministry of Interior's agencies are fulfilling their duty in serving the displaced in 215 shelters across the Gaza Strip, as well as hospitals that have transformed into shelters." He followed by saying, "With one month passing since the Israeli assault on Gaza, the number of casualties has exceeded 37,230, including martyrs, missing persons, and injured, along with more than 1.6 million displaced and homeless individuals."
Al-Bazam emphasized that "the occupation focuses its aggression recently on what remains of life essentials in the Gaza and North Gaza governorates by bombing water tanks, food supplies, bakeries, solar panels, shelters, and hospitals, seeking to forcibly displace citizens." He noted that "the occupation army does not deserve to be called an 'army'; armies have ethics, and what we see is the behavior of criminal gangs that are not governed by morals, norms, or laws. Every raid on Gaza signifies a new massacre, and every Israeli bomb destroys homes and kills innocent civilians within them."
He added, "Every minute that passes in Gaza under the ongoing aggression means new victims, and we appeal to all people of conscience to make every effort to stop the aggression."
The Ministry of Health urged today, Sunday, that the International Committee of the Red Cross or Egypt provide a safe passage for the exit of the injured from the Strip. Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra stated, "We ask the International Committee of the Red Cross to work on providing a safe corridor for the exit of the injured and to escort them, ensuring their safe arrival at the Rafah border crossing for transfers to hospitals in the Arab Republic of Egypt." He also proposed an alternative option, stating that "we request our brothers in the Arab Republic of Egypt to allow Egyptian ambulances to enter and reach hospitals in the Gaza Strip to transfer the injured from Gazan hospitals to Egyptian hospitals to secure their safe exit so they are not targeted by the Israeli occupation forces."
The Gaza Health Ministry reported today that 21 Palestinians from the same family were killed in an Israeli strike on the Gaza Strip last night. It also announced that 9,770 Palestinians, including 4,800 children, have been killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza since October 7.
In a statement, World Food Programme chief Cindy McCain said today that the aid coming into Gaza is not nearly enough to meet the rapidly increasing needs of the population there. McCain added, following her visit to the Rafah crossing, "We need to continue working together to safely and sustainably access Gaza at a scale that aligns with the catastrophic conditions families are facing there."
On the ground, Palestinian factions continue to resist Israeli advance attempts in the combat zones, occasionally announcing losses in lives and equipment on the Israeli army's side.
Additionally, warplanes launched intense airstrikes on western and northern Gaza neighborhoods, dropping internationally banned white phosphorus bombs, especially on the al-Shati refugee camp in western Gaza. The warplanes carried out at least 15 strikes around the Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza and bombed the main water well in the Tal al-Zaatar area, north of the Strip. The Israeli army intensified its raids on residential areas, targeting a residential area in the Jabalia camp northeast of Gaza, and the Israeli navy fired at the shores of Rafah, while Israeli artillery and naval boats shelled the western outskirts of northern Gaza.
