Numbers of victims, homeless families and bulldozed agricultural lands are constantly increasing as Israeli forces carry on their “days of penitence” operation, their bloodiest assault on Gaza in years.
More than 95 people have died and over 380 injured in less than eight days, including more than 23 children killed. The latest victims were a teenage girl, who was shot as she approached an army watchtower in northern Gaza, in addition to a four-year-old child who was also killed in Khan Yonis.
Iman al-Hams and two other girls, all of them wearing school uniforms, passed a watchtower in Rafah refugee camp, and when Israeli forces entered the area al-Hams and her classmates tried to run so the soldiers fired at her, she was peppered with 20 bullets, in her head, chest and legs.
According to Israeli forces, the area was restricted, and they suspected that Iman’s schoolbag contained a bomb, before even checking it.
The current raid is trapping 50,000 Palestinians in their areas by hundreds of Israeli troops, backed by 200 tanks and armored vehicles. Jabaliya and Beit Hanoun residents are completely disconnected from all surrounding areas.
The living conditions are beyond desperate; thousands of people are currently living without power or water supplies, hundreds of homes were demolished in addition to the central sewage system which contaminated the water supplies in Jabaliya refugee camp and the town of Beit Hanoun.
In Beit Hanoun, 15,000 Palestinians live without water, Aref Azaneed, a ministry of agriculture inspector, said: "The water and the sewage lines are near each other. When the tanks destroy them, they mix. The water from the tap has sewage in it."
Israeli forces imposed complete closure on Gaza and prohibited journalists and news agencies from entering. Ambulance drivers, the only Palestinians allowed into the occupied areas confirmed the major destruction, entire streets were wiped out and tens of homes were demolished on the edge of Jabaliya.
The Israeli army claimed that it only destroyed “small numbers” of houses were soldiers were attacked or in order to avoid booby trapped roads.
Moreover, the Israeli army wrongly accused Hamas militants of loading Qassam rockets into a UN ambulance, according to Haaretz, Israeli Forces chief of operations Yisrael Ziv did not confirm Tuesday evening whether or not the army was justified in its accusation.
Israeli accused UNRWA, the UN Relief Works Agency for Palestinian refugees, of “harboring terrorists” after the release of a footage that shows militants allegedly loading a rocket into a UN ambulance.
The UN spokesperson confirmed that the footage shows a man carrying a stretcher into the vehicle. On Monday, Peter Hansen, the UN top official in Gaza, wrote to the Israeli foreign minister, Silvan Shalom, accusing Israel of inventing the story.
