Israeli forces move deeper into Gaza

Gaza, Sept 18: On Wednesday, Israeli troops and tanks continued their ground offensive into Gaza City, causing mass evacuations of Palestinians.
The military claimed that air force and artillery units had struck the city over 150 times in the last few days, toppling high-rise towers in areas densely populated by tent camps where thousands of Palestinians are sheltering. Israel claims the towers are being used by Hamas to surveil troops.
Overnight strikes killed at least 16 people, including women and children, hospital officials reported. The death count in Gaza is nearing 65,000 Palestinians since the war began on October 7, 2023 with a Hamas-led attack on Israel.
Palestinians streamed out of the city, some by car or others on foot. Israel opened another corridor south of Gaza City for two days beginning Wednesday to allow more people to evacuate.
More than half of the Palestinians killed in overnight Israeli strikes were in famine-stricken Gaza City, including a child and his mother who died in their apartment in the Shati refugee camp.
In central Gaza, an Israeli strike hit a house in the urban Nuseirat refugee camp, killing three, including a pregnant woman. Two parents and their child were also killed when a strike hit their tent in the Muwasi area west of the city of Khan Younis.
The Gaza Health Ministry reported multiple Israeli strikes hitting the Rantisi Hospital for children in Gaza City on Tuesday night. The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government, said the strikes forced half of some 80 patients to flee the facility.
About 40 patients, including four children in intensive care and eight premature babies, remained in the hospital with 30 medical workers.
The Israeli military said it was looking into the strikes, but in the past it has accused Hamas of building military infrastructure inside civilian areas.
A coalition of leading aid groups urged the international community to take stronger measures to stop Israel’s offensive on Gaza City, following a commission of UN experts finding Israel was committing genocide in the Palestinian enclave.
The UN estimates that more than 2,38,000 Palestinians of some 1 million believed living in the city have fled northern Gaza over the past month. Hundreds of thousands more have stayed behind.
Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned Israel’s ground offensive in the strongest terms, stating that the operation marked an “extension of the war of genocide” against the Palestinians. Israel’s return to Gaza City is expected to result in the control of all of the Gaza Strip except for a large swath along the coast by the end of the current operation.