DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli strikes on northern Gaza have killed at least 22 people, mostly women and children, Palestinian officials said Sunday…
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip Israeli strikes on northern Gaza have killed at least 22 people, mostly women and children, Palestinian officials said Sunday, as its offensive in the hard-hit and isolated north entered a third week and aid groups described a humanitarian catastrophe.
The Gaza Health Ministry’s emergency service said that 11 women and two children were among those killed in the strikes late Saturday on several homes and buildings in the northern town of Beit Lahiya. It said another 15 people were wounded and that the death toll could rise. It listed the names of those killed, who mostly came from three families.
The Israeli military said it carried out a precise strike on militants in a structure in Beit Lahiya and took steps to avoid harming civilians. It disputed what it said were “numbers published by the media,” without elaborating or providing evidence for its own account.
Israel is still carrying out daily strikes across Gaza, even as it wages and air and ground war with the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon. Two people were wounded after an explosive drone launched from Lebanon slammed into a building in an industrial area of northern Israel, authorities said. An Israeli airstrike on a southern neighborhood of Beirut sent flames and smoke climbing into the air.
On Saturday, Israeli warplanes attacked military targets in Iran — which backs both Hamas and Hezbollah — in response to an Iranian ballistic missile attack earlier this month.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Sunday that Israel’s attack “should not be exaggerated nor downplayed,” while stopping short of calling for retaliation. His remarks are the latest suggesting Iran is carefully weighing its response to the attack.
“It is up to the authorities to determine how to convey the power and will of the Iranian people to the Israeli regime and to take actions that serve the interests of this nation and country,” said Khamenei, who has the final say over all major decisions in Iran.
