The Palestine Red Crescent Society reported yesterday that it has treated numerous Palestinians, including children, injured in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza, even though it lacks adequate resources and supplies.
Israel and Hamas fighters engaged in fierce battles in parts of Jabalia, where Israeli air attacks have also been frequent.
Earlier, an Israeli air strike hit a family home in Jabalia, killing at least four people in addition to causing injuries, according to the Wafa news agency.
Media reported in the US yesterday that the Biden administration has told Congress it plans to send a $1bn package of military aid to Israel despite the US’s purported opposition to a full-scale invasion of Rafah and concerns about rising civilian deaths.
On Tuesday, the US State Department moved the package into the congressional review process.
The package, which is yet to be approved, includes about $700m for tank ammunition, $500m in tactical vehicles and $60m in mortar rounds, congressional aides said.
The new package is being presented as the long-term US commitment to supplying Israel with weaponry.
Meanwhile, member of the Hamas political bureau, Sami Abu Zuhri, said on Tuesday that it is ‘meaningless’ to conclude any agreement with the Israeli occupation unless the latter commits to a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
He stressed that the Israeli occupation must adhere to the conditions demanded by the resistance, foremost of which is an end to the ongoing aggression.
Abu Zuhri pointed out that ‘the occupation is what obstructs and impedes reaching an agreement’.
- Israel’s war on Gaza is leaving tens of thousands of pregnant women struggling with terrible sanitary conditions and health risks, the UN refugee agency UNRWA warned.
‘More than 150,000 pregnant women are facing terrible sanitary conditions and health hazards amid displacement and war,’ UNRWA said in a statement.
According to UNICEF, 95 per cent of pregnant and breastfeeding women face severe food poverty in the war-torn Gaza Strip.
The United Nations Population Fund has recently reported that urgent aid packages containing materials for childbirth are still waiting for permission to enter through the Rafah crossing.
The death toll of the Israeli aggression on the Strip since October 7 has risen to 35,091. Over 78,827 people have been wounded.
The situation for women in Gaza is particularly dire, as they represent one of the main categories of those killed, wounded, and missing.
- Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the Palestinian territory, said sanitised jargon used by the Israeli military during its onslaught against civilians in Gaza is designed to ‘camouflage’ killing.
Albanese said Israel’s use of terms from international humanitarian law – such as ‘evacuation orders’ and ‘safe zones’ – ‘create the illusion that its military operations ensure protection of civilians’.
‘The reality could not be further from the truth,’ she said in a post on social media.
‘This “humanitarian camouflage” has de facto turned Gaza into a place “without civilians”, where everything is destroyable & everyone is killable.’
