Israeli air strikes have made cemeteries in Gaza dangerous to reach so mourning families are burying their dead in informal graveyards dug in empty lots
Israeli air strikes are pounding the Gaza Strip for a sixth consecutive day as fears of a humanitarian disaster in the besieged Palestinian enclave mount.
Israel on Thursday said it has dropped 6,000 bombs weighing 4,000 tonnes on Gaza in the past six days, killing more than 1,400 people.
Officials in Gaza said the dead included 447 children, 248 women and 10 healthcare workers. More than 150 people were killed on Thursday alone.
Entire neighbourhoods in Gaza – home to 2.3 million people, half of them children – have been destroyed by the incessant bombing, forcing 338,000 Palestinians to flee their homes and take shelter.
The death toll in the occupied West Bank has also surged to 31 while more than 600 people have been injured, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
On the Israeli side, at least 1,300 people have been killed since the armed Palestinian group Hamas attacked southern Israel and took at least 100 people captive on Saturday.
Israel has imposed a complete siege of Gaza, cutting access to food, water, medicines and fuel, as its forces prepare for a possible ground assault.
Gazans rendered homeless by bombing
The United Nations humanitarian office said Israeli bombardment of Gaza has levelled more than 1,000 homes since Saturday while another 560 housing units have been severely damaged and rendered uninhabitable.
More than 12,600 homes have sustained damage due to Israeli air strikes, said the agency, called the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
It said the reduction in water supplies due to Israel tightening its siege on the strip has resulted in dire water shortages for more than 650,000 people.
Gaza plunged into darkness after power plant runs out of fuel
Sewage systems have been destroyed, OCHA added, sending fetid wastewater into the streets and posing a health hazard.
Israeli air strikes have made cemeteries in Gaza dangerous to reach so mourning families are burying their dead in informal graveyards dug in empty lots, reports said.
Hospitals ‘risk turning into morgues’
Human rights groups said Gaza’s health system, already stretched to its limits by a 16-year blockade, is on the verge of complete collapse. The enclave’s only power plant was forced to shut down on Wednesday after it ran out of fuel.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Gaza’s hospitals “risk turning into morgues” as severely wounded civilians, including infants, are rushed inside its crowded wards, where beds and medical supplies are running out.
“As Gaza loses power, hospitals lose power, putting newborns in incubators and elderly patients on oxygen at risk,” said Fabrizio Carboni, the ICRC’s regional director.
OCHA said all 13 hospitals in the territory are only partially operational due to severe shortages of fuel and crucial medical supplies.
Israel on Thursday said there would be no humanitarian exceptions to its siege of Gaza until all its hostages are freed by Hamas.
“Humanitarian aid to Gaza? No electrical switch will be lifted, no water hydrant will be opened and no fuel truck will enter until the Israeli hostages are returned home,” Israeli Energy Minister Israel Katz said in a social media post.
Egypt says facilitating aid flights to Gaza
Egypt on Thursday said it was directing international aid flights for Gaza to an airport in northern Sinai although Israeli bombardments along the border have so far hampered the delivery of the relief.
The Rafah border crossing between the Sinai and Gaza remained open, the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, adding that Egypt asked Israel to avoid targeting the Palestinian side of the crossing after strikes prevented normal operations there.
Israel’s bombing and total siege on Gaza has caused alarm in Egypt, which shares a border with the south of the narrow coastal enclave.
El Arish airport in northern Sinai, about 45km (28 miles) from the Gaza border, was prepared to receive aid deliveries from Qatar and Jordan, but these would not leave the airport until humanitarian corridors had been established, Egyptian security sources told the Reuters news agency.