Israeli attacks kill dozens of people across the Gaza Strip, including 27 in one attack

CNN
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An Israeli airstrike on a multi-story building in northern Gaza has killed at least 27 people, aid officials said, as the Israeli military issued new evacuation orders for the area where it is launching a major offensive.

The Mbahouh family's home in Jabalya was attacked on Thursday afternoon, according to Gaza Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Basal.

He said the four-story property housed more than 50 displaced people and some were trapped in a warehouse at the base of the building.

CNN is contacting the Israeli military regarding the target of the attack.

Also on Thursday, an Israeli airstrike hit the Al-Shati refugee camp in Gaza City. In another attack, at least four people were killed at the Al-Rimal school west of Gaza City, Basal said.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed the airstrike on the Al-Shati refugee camp and claimed the school was being used by Hamas as a “command and control center.” The IDF said it was not commenting on the second attack without coordinates.

The Israeli military operation in Gaza since the Hamas-led attacks on October 7th has destroyed entire neighborhoods and made large parts of the Gaza Strip uninhabitable.

According to the Ministry of Health there, at least 43,469 Palestinians were killed and another 102,561 people were injured in Gaza.

Human rights groups warned of “apocalyptic” survival problems for Palestinians trapped in Jabalya, home to a large refugee camp, where the Israeli military stepped up air and ground strikes in early October, allegedly targeting Hamas's renewed presence in the region.

The British-based non-governmental organization Medical Aid for Palestine accused Israel in a statement to CNN on Monday of “making impossible the survival of Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip as part of a policy of sustained pressure and violent displacement.”

Israeli airstrikes and shelling have reportedly killed at least 30 more people in Gaza since Wednesday. Most of these Palestinians were killed by Israeli strikes in the Beit Lahiya area of ​​the northern Gaza Strip.

An Israeli airstrike hit a residential building in the Mashrou' neighborhood of Beit Lahiya, killing six people and wounding several others, journalists and medics say. They added that another six people were killed in a second attack in the same area. Four others were killed in a separate drone strike in Beit Lahiya, it said.

In addition, according to local journalists, six people were killed by Israeli artillery fire west of the Jabalya camp in the north of the Gaza Strip.

The head of the field hospitals in Gaza, Dr. Marwan Al-Hams, told CNN on Thursday that “the health situation in the north is beyond catastrophic… Three hospitals in the north of the Gaza Strip are out of service and we cannot carry out operations.”

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that “troops began deploying in the Beit Lahiya area following previous intelligence and a situational assessment that indicated the presence of terrorists and terrorist infrastructure.”

The IDF said it was also continuing its operations in Jabalya, northern Gaza, and had killed about “50 terrorists” in the past day.

A displaced aid worker in Gaza City recounted the mental anguish of being displaced from one neighborhood to another after the Israeli military issued new evacuation orders for Palestinians in northern Gaza on Thursday.

Mahmoud Shalabi, MAP's deputy program director, said he had been forced to flee at least seven times since October 2023 – including from the northern Gaza Strip to Gaza City. Shalabi's statement was shared with CNN by MAP.

“I'm really unsure if I'll be able to see my home again. And even if I were allowed to return, our houses will remain as they are,” he said on Thursday. “It’s like it’s a new Nakba.

“We are being forced to flee our homes with brutal force,” he added. “My three children keep asking me, 'When are we going back home?' And I really can't answer that question.

“To exist on this land is to resist,” Shalabi said. “I won't go. I want to live a dignified life.”

The military's Arabic spokesman, Avichay Adraee, published on

Adraee said that “the specified area has already been warned several times.” We inform you that the specified area is considered a dangerous combat zone. Therefore, for your safety, head south immediately.”

Elsewhere in central Gaza, Civil Defense said it had recovered eight bodies after an attack in Al-Nuseirat refugee camp on Wednesday evening, according to a CNN observer on the scene.

A male witness, Salim Mohammed Alaa Abu Najeh, told CNN that his sister's home was attacked.

“They were at home when suddenly a rocket hit their building… They have no connection to any organizations or anything like that. They were unarmed, poor people in difficult circumstances who fought to build this house.”

Among the building's residents are orphans who were raised by their grandmother, Abu Najeh said.

CNN asked the IDF about the target of the attack.

Israeli operations also continue in the southern Gaza Strip, where the IDF said on Thursday that “a number of armed terrorists” had been killed in the Rafah area.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said medics brought five bodies to hospital as a result of an Israeli drone strike in the Al-Janina neighborhood, east of the southern Gaza city of Rafah. Journalists said four of those killed were from the same family.

In addition, two people were killed in an attack by an Israeli military quadcopter.