At least 41 Palestinians were killed in Israeli shelling of the Gaza Strip on Monday, while 14 others died due to hunger and malnutrition amid the ongoing blockade, according to officials, reported Xinhua.
Mahmoud Basal, spokesman for the Civil Defense Authority in Gaza, told Xinhua that Israeli warplanes launched a series of airstrikes on residential neighborhoods and displacement shelters across the besieged enclave early on Monday, leaving dozens of casualties.
He said 25 people were killed in Israeli air raids targeting homes, makeshift tents for the displaced, and public gatherings in the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza.
Basal added that seven Palestinians were killed and 22 others injured after Israeli forces bombed a crowd of civilians waiting for humanitarian aid near the U.S.-backed aid distribution site at the Netzarim corridor in central Gaza.
In separate incidents, three civilians were killed when an Israeli missile struck an apartment building in the Daraj neighborhood in eastern Gaza City, while two others lost their lives in an attack on the Namaa College area in northern Gaza, according to Basal.
In central Gaza, an Israeli airstrike killed a man, his wife, and their daughter in the Maghazi refugee camp. A separate attack on a house in Deir al-Balah killed one woman and wounded several others, Basal said.
Meanwhile, eyewitnesses reported that Israeli forces continued demolishing homes in the Shuja'iyya neighborhood of eastern Gaza City and in eastern Khan Younis.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli army on these incidents.
In addition to casualties from military operations, the humanitarian situation in the enclave continues to worsen.
Gaza's health authorities reported Monday that 14 Palestinians, including several children, died in the past 24 hours due to famine and malnutrition caused by the Israeli-imposed blockade on Gaza, raising the total number of such deaths to 147, among them 88 were children, since the start of the conflict.
The Hamas-run government media office in Gaza said Monday that more than 40,000 infants under one year of age in Gaza are at risk of "slow death" as the continued Israeli blockade has prevented the entry of baby formula into the enclave.
Source: www.dailyfinland.fi
