Tens of thousands of Palestinians are fleeing from northern Gaza the region becomes ‘hell on earth’, while Israel’s forces push deeper against Hamas terrorists holed up in dense urban areas.
Fighting intensified as officials in the besieged enclave said the Palestinian death toll has surpassed 11,000 people.
The search for safety in Gaza is growing more desperate as combat intensifies. Residents who escaped to the south and Palestinian health officials reported strikes in and around Gaza City’s main hospital overnight.
Israel said at least one was the result of a misfired Palestinian rocket.
The World Health Organization said Friday that 20 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are no longer functioning, including a pediatric hospital that stopped operations after a reported Israeli strike in the area.
The UN humanitarian agency spokesperson, Jens Laerke, said: “If there is a hell on earth today, its name is northern Gaza,”
More than two-thirds of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have fled their homes since the war began. In the south, they’re crowded into shelters with dwindling supplies of food and water as the war enters its second month.
Gaza City, the largest urban area in the territory, is the focus of Israel’s campaign to crush Hamas following the militant group’s deadly October 7 terror attack on southern Israel that set off the war.
More than 1,200 people in Israel died, most of them in the Hamas attack, and about 240 hostages were taken from Israel into Gaza by Palestinian militants.
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