ed note–we’ll forgoe the usual extended commentary for something short and bitter, and from no less an authority on the subject than Mr Armageddon himself, Benjamen Netanyahu–
’Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass…’
Reuters
Gaza is becoming a ‘graveyard for children’, U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres said on Monday, amplifying demands for a ceasefire in the enclave, where Palestinian health authorities said the death toll from Israeli strikes had exceeded 10,000.
Both Israel and the Hamas militants who control Gaza have rebuffed mounting international pressure for a ceasefire. Israel says hostages taken by Hamas during its rampage in southern Israel on Oct. 7 should be released first; Hamas says it will not free them or stop fighting while Gaza is under assault.
‘Ground operations by the Israel Defense Forces and continued bombardment are hitting civilians, hospitals, refugee camps, mosques, churches and U.N. facilities – including shelters. No one is safe,’ Guterres told reporters.
Israel said 31 soldiers had been killed since it began expanded ground operations in Gaza on Oct. 27 and reiterated that Hamas was hiding with civilians and at hospitals. Hamas said the idea that Hamas was based in hospitals was a ‘false narrative that the U.N. should verify.
A Reuters journalist in Gaza said Israel’s overnight bombardment by air, ground and sea was one of its most intense since the Oct. 7 attack in which Hamas killed 1,400 people in Israel and seized more than 240 hostages.
The health ministry in the Hamas-controlled enclave said at least 10,022 people in Gaza have since been killed, including 4,104 children.
‘Gaza is becoming a graveyard for children. Hundreds of girls and boys are reportedly being killed or injured every day,’ Guterres said.
International organisations have said hospitals cannot cope with the wounded, while food and clean water are running out with aid deliveries nowhere near enough.
Guterres said 89 people working with the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) were among the dead. UNRWA said five colleagues had been killed in the past 24 hours alone.
The health ministry in Gaza said dozens of people were killed by Israeli air strikes in the north and south, including on Gaza City’s Rantissi cancer hospital, where eight people were killed. Israel’s military said it was looking into the report.
Gaza’s health ministry spokesman said an air strike had also hit a building belonging to Gaza’s largest hospital, Al Shifa, where 170 people were being treated and hundreds of evacuees were sheltering. One person was killed and several were wounded, he said.
Israel denies it had struck the hospital.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said it had escorted a four-ambulance convoy of patients from Gaza City to the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. Evacuations had been suspended since an Israeli strike on an ambulance on Friday but three Egyptian security sources said dozens of foreign passport holders also left on Monday.
Meanwhile, people searched for victims or survivors at the Maghazi refugee camp in Gaza, where the health ministry said Israeli forces had killed at least 47 people in strikes early on Sunday.
‘All night I and the other men were trying to pick the dead from the rubble. We got children, dismembered, torn-apart flesh,’ said Saeed al-Nejma, 53.
Asked for comment, the Israeli military said it was ‘gathering details’ about it.
The Israeli military said a four-hour window for civilians to leave the north would be repeated daily. U.N. monitoring showed fewer than 2,000 people used the corridor on Sunday, citing fear and road damage. A U.S. envoy said on Saturday between 350,000 and 400,000 people were still in the north.