Following a seven-day humanitarian pause, which began on Nov.24 between Israel and Hamas, bombing re-ensued in the Gaza Strip and parts of Israel. According to an Al Jazeera article, the truce was initially supposed to be four days and was extended twice before ending on Friday, Dec. 1. Under the terms of the truce, humanitarian aid was allowed to enter Gaza, fighting was paused, and hostage and prisoner exchanges took place between the two sides.
According to CBS News, Israel said it is expanding its ground offense to every part of Gaza, vowing that operations there would carry “no less strength” than their operations in the North. Reuters reported that Deputy Hamas Chief Salah Al-Arouri stated on Saturday that prisoner exchanges will not resume until there is a ceasefire in Gaza.
Since Oct. 7, according to the Associated Press (AP), following Israel’s bombardment and ground campaign, over three-quarters of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced into the South of Gaza and are currently in a humanitarian crisis. According to UN News, United Nations (UN) human rights chief Volker Türk stated, “as a result of Israel’s conduct of hostilities and its orders for people to leave the north and parts of the south, hundreds of thousands are being confined into ever smaller areas in southern Gaza without proper sanitation, access to sufficient food, water and health supplies, even as bombs rain down around them … there is no safe place in Gaza.”
According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), despite the humanitarian pause, on Nov. 29 at 6:00 p.m. Gaza time, Israeli troops reportedly opened fire at Palestinians in Northern Gaza, killing two people. On Nov. 30, additional shooting incidents resulting in casualties were also reported in Gaza City. Since the start of hostilities, the Government Media Office (GMO) in Gaza reported that “more than 15,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, including about 6,150 children and 4,000 women.” The Gaza Ministry of Health (MoH), which was previously documenting casualty numbers but has since stopped due to the “collapse of services and communications at hospitals in the North,” reported that since Oct.7, at least 198 Palestinian medics, 113 UN staff have been killed, and according to the Palestinian Journalist Syndicate, 70 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza. Official Israeli sources stated that 75 Israeli soldiers have died in combat during Israeli ground operations in Gaza.
According to The Guardian, Israel dropped leaflets over four towns in Khan Younis, telling civilians in Bani Shuhaila, Khuza’a, Abassan and al-Qarara to evacuate and that anyone in those areas was “putting his life in danger.” The leaflets read, “For your safety, you need to evacuate your places of residence immediately and head to known shelters … Anyone near terrorists or their facilities puts their life at risk, and every house used by terrorists will be targeted.” Saturday night and into Sunday (Gaza time), Al Jazeera reported intense bombing in parts of Khan Younis, Rafah and some areas of Northern Gaza by Israeli air and ground strike teams. Since Israel resumed bombing on Friday, according to the Director General of the Government Media Office in Gaza’s comment to Al Jazeera, over 700 Palestinians have been killed as of Sunday, December 3.
People sheltering in Khan Younis, a district in the south of Gaza previously characterized as a safe area, according to a Reuters article, on Saturday, Dec. 2, faced aerial bombardment from Israel. In recent weeks, the population of Khan Younis has swelled by several hundreds of thousands of people sheltering from the bombardment in Northern Gaza. Some are “camping in tents, others in schools, while some are sleeping in stairwells or outside the few hospitals operating in the city.”
In Northern Gaza, The Guardian reported that Israeli operations in al-Shifa hospital have continued and that Israel Defense Force (IDF) troops were still inside the hospital searching “in a discreet, methodical and thorough manner.” IDF officials claim to have located “intelligence material, military technologies and equipment, command and control centers and communications equipment belonging to Hamas” in the hospital. Hamas responded to these allegations, stating that Israel’s claims are “nothing but a continuation of the lies and cheap propaganda, through which [Israel] is trying to give justification for its crime aimed at destroying the health sector in Gaza.” Israel claims that the original raid on the hospital was due to Hamas having a command center under the hospital and tunnels holding hostages, all allegations Hamas has denied.
