Deir al-Balah, Sep 6: The Israeli army issued evacuation orders and targeted high-rise buildings in famine-stricken Gaza City on Saturday, calling on Palestinians to move to the territory’s south as it escalates operations ahead of a new offensive to seize the city of nearly 1 million.
Aid groups warn that a large-scale evacuation would exacerbate the humanitarian crisis in Gaza City, which the world’s leading hunger watchdog says is suffering from famine as a result of Israel’s restrictions on food into the territory.
Most families have already been displaced several times over the nearly two-year-long Israel-Hamas war and say they have nowhere left to go, as the Israeli military has repeatedly bombed tent encampments that it had designated as humanitarian zones.
Some Palestinians – who at times have nothing to eat for days in a row – say they are too weak to uproot themselves again.
Israeli army urges Palestinians to move to a humanitarian zone Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee urged Palestinians on Saturday to flee to the south of the Gaza Strip, saying that the army had declared the makeshift tent encampment of Muwasi and parts of the southern town of Khan Younis to be a humanitarian zone.
It shared a map of Khan Younis neighbourhoods within the redrawn borders of the humanitarian zone, which covered the district home to Nasser Hospital. Israel hit the hospital last week killing 22 people, including five journalists – among them Mariam Dagga, who worked for The Associated Press and other media outlets.
Palestinians would be able to drive from Gaza City to Khan Younis, and the overcrowded coastal community of Muwasi to the town’s west, via a designated road without being searched, Adraee said.
Aid groups have raised alarm about woefully inadequate shelter, sanitation, water and food in Muwasi. Months of bombardment have decimated civilian infrastructure in Khan Younis.
The military said in a statement that it would work to provide field hospitals, water pipelines and food supplies within its newly designated humanitarian zone.
The United Nations on Saturday said its staff would remain in Gaza City to provide badly needed aid to Palestinians caught up in Israel’s renewed assault on the city. It said Palestinians who heed Israeli evacuation orders must be able to return voluntarily when the situation allows.
Exhausted and despairing, many Palestinians said they won’t pack up and leave again. “Nowhere is safe across the strip,” said Gaza City resident Ayman Abo Saif, adding that the surge of displaced people in the overcrowded south had sent rents soaring to over USD 7 a day for just 25 square metres (270 square feet). (AP)
