Israel expands offensive in Gaza

On Monday, Israel increased its onslaught against Hamas in the confined Gaza Strip as global alarm over the conflict’s rising death toll of civilians grew.

A region on the verge of a bigger conflict has been impacted by Israel and Hamas’s resumption to open battle following the expiration of their truce.

Israeli airstrikes on Palestinian territory, rocket launches against Israel, and combat between Hamas and Israeli troops in Gaza have all resumed since the cease-fire on Friday expired.

Israeli airstrikes on northern Gaza during the weekend sent billowing clouds of dust and smoke into the sky.

The Israeli army claimed to have intercepted the majority of the rocket salvos fired from Gaza into Israel on Sunday.

The entrance of the Kamal Adwan hospital in the northern region of the territory was struck by a strike late on Sunday, according to the Palestinian authority in Gaza and the official news agency Wafa.

While Hamas accused Israel on Telegram of a “grave violation” of humanitarian law, the news agency reported that several individuals were killed in the incident.

When AFP contacted the Israeli military, they declined to comment on the strike right away.

Israel claims that Hamas exploits civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, for military ends; the resistance movement disputes this claim.

According to Israel military spokesman Daniel Hagari, “the IDF continues to expand its ground operation against main Hamas fronts in the Gaza Strip,” on Sunday.

“The Israel Defense Forces operate wherever there is a Hamas stronghold,” he declared.
In response to Hamas’ strikes on Israel on October 7, Israel has threatened to destroy the resistance organization.

During the strikes, an estimated 240 more people were carried into Gaza as prisoners.

Since October 7, over 15,500 individuals have died in the Gaza Strip, more than half of them were women and children, according to the health ministry.

In exchange for the release of 240 Palestinian prisoners detained in Israeli jails, 80 Israeli hostages were liberated in a truce brokered by Qatar with assistance from Egypt and the US.

Additionally, about two dozen other prisoners were released from Gaza.

Nonetheless, despite requests for an extension from across the world, fighting broke out between the two sides again on Friday.

The Israeli negotiators were being removed from Qatar “following the impasse in the negotiations” aimed at extending the truce, according to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office the following day.

The Israeli military reports that Hamas has ruled out further releases of its prisoners until a permanent ceasefire is reached, with 137 currently being held in Gaza.

The Israeli military announced on Sunday that it has launched about 10,000 airstrikes since the conflict began. Israel announced on Sunday that two of its soldiers had lost their lives in battle—the first since the cease-fire.

Spokesman for the Gaza health ministry Ashraf al-Qudra said in a statement, “In the last few hours, only 316 dead and 664 injured people have been rescued from the rubble and taken to hospital, but many others are still stuck under the rubble.”

Concern over Israel’s handling of the campaign to destroy Hamas is intensifying on a global scale in response to the increasing death toll in Gaza.

Hospitals in southern Gaza were brimming on Sunday with the dead and injured, some of whom were sobbing with anguish.

In a video filmed at Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis, James Elder, a spokesman for UNICEF, remarked, “I am running out of ways to describe the horrors hitting children here.”

“The bombardment of south Gaza at the moment is the worst of the war. In the video that was uploaded to X, formerly Twitter, he stated, “I am seeing tremendous casualties among children.

Huda, nine, was hurt in the head and was part of a convoy carrying injured from northern Gaza to the Deir al-Balah hospital, organized by the International Committee of the Red Cross.

“She is no longer responding to me,” her father Abdelkarim Abu Warda sobbed.

The United States, an ally of Israel that gives it billions of dollars in military aid every year, has stepped up calls to protect civilians in Gaza.

“Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed,” Vice President Kamala Harris said to reporters during the UN climate negotiations in Dubai.

Eylon Levy, a spokesman for the Israeli government, stated that Hamas was to blame for the fatalities and that the victims “would still be alive” if the organization had not carried out the October 7 strikes.

According to the US Central Command, a US destroyer engaged in drone warfare over the Red Sea on Sunday while supporting commercial ships, allaying concerns about a potential regional conflict.

The Houthi fighters, who claimed to have targeted two of the ships, have been firing missiles and drones at Israel for the past few weeks, and they also took control of a cargo ship last month. Nonetheless, the threat to shipping in the region has significantly increased as a result of the most recent strikes.

According to Iraqi security sources, an airstrike on Sunday claimed the lives of at least five pro-Iranian fighters in Iraq, one day after Baghdad had forewarned Washington against “attacks” on its soil.

Additionally, there was fighting along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon.

In reaction to cross-border gunfire, the Israeli army claimed to have undertaken artillery attacks, and its fighter jets destroyed several targets associated with the Lebanese guerrilla organization Hezbollah.

Hezbollah claimed to have attacked Israeli positions multiple times, including hitting a military vehicle with a missile