BUREIJ REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip — The grey movie overlaying the faces of kids rushed to Al-Aqsa Hospital in central Gaza Thursday made it laborious to tell apart between the residing and the {dead}.
After two Israeli airstrikes flattened a complete block of condo buildings within the Bureij refugee camp and broken two U.N. schools-turned-shelters, rubble-covered Palestinians huge and small arrived at a hospital too packed to take them.
Tiny, immobile our bodies lay flat towards the hospital’s laborious flooring. A small boy bled out onto the tiles as medics tried to staunch the movement from his head. A child lay subsequent to him with an oxygen masks strapped on — coated in ash, his chest struggled to rise and fall. Their father sat beside them.
“Right here they’re, America! Right here they’re, Israel!” he screamed. “They’re kids. Our youngsters die each day.”
Greater than 3,700 Palestinian kids and minors have been killed in just below a month of combating, and bombings have pushed greater than half the territory’s 2.3 million folks from their properties, whereas food, water and gasoline run low.
As Israeli troops encircle Gaza Metropolis and press forward with a floor offensive, the loss of life toll is anticipated to develop.
The struggle was triggered by the Hamas militant group’s brutal cross-border assault on Oct. 7, which killed some 1,400 folks in Israel and took some 240 others hostage. Greater than 9,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed since then, based on the Well being Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza. It’s the fifth and by far deadliest struggle between the 2 enemies.
It was not instantly clear why Israel focused Bureij, which is situated in central Gaza in an space the place Israel has urged folks to go to remain secure from heavy combating additional north.
The military stated that airstrikes throughout Gaza had focused Hamas navy command facilities hidden in civilian areas. However its assertion didn’t point out Bureij particularly. Israel accuses Hamas of utilizing civilians as human shields.
The Bureij strikes Thursday killed not less than 15, Gaza’s Civil Protection stated. It stated dozens of others have been believed to be buried within the rubble.
Paramedics and first-responders have struggled to evacuate the injured and the {dead} as a result of crippled infrastructure and gasoline shortages. As a substitute, casualties movement into hospitals within the arms of family, neighbors or anybody in a position to transport the wounded.
In Bureij, which is dwelling to an estimated 46,000 folks, Palestinians hacked on the rubble, trying to find survivors. A younger lady discovered below the deluge was carried into the emergency room. Together with her foot bloody and her face coated in ash, she insisted to medics she was high quality.
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Frankel reported from Jerusalem.
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Discover extra of AP’s protection at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war