Cairo: Israeli forces have issued fresh evacuation orders to Palestinians in the northern Gaza Strip, one of the first areas hit at the start of the war with Hamas in October, after the terrorist group fired new rockets into Israel.
Military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted evacuation orders for several districts in Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya, two largely destroyed towns that Israeli tanks had attacked at the start of Israel's ground offensive.
“Hamas and terrorist groups are firing rockets from your territory towards the State of Israel. The Israeli military will take immediate and firm action against them,” Adrei said in a text message and social media message to Palestinians.
“For your own safety, immediately evacuate to a known shelter in the center of Gaza,” the military spokesman said.
In a nearby part of Gaza City, an Israeli airstrike hit a house, killing three Palestinians, a doctor said.
Later on Wednesday, 10 Palestinians were killed in two Israeli attacks in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis. Doctors said one attack killed three people on a motorcycle west of Khan Younis, while seven others were killed in tank fire that hit a tent camp in the town of Abassan, east of the city.
Multiple fronts
Fighting continues in the Gaza Strip as Israel braces for a northern attack from Iran and its close ally Hezbollah in Lebanon following the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in the Iranian capital Tehran on July 31.
The Israeli military says it has killed dozens of fighters in the Gaza Strip in recent days, and on Wednesday it said it had hit a weapons factory in Deir al-Balah, a region where tens of thousands of Palestinians displaced by the fighting are taking refuge.
Elsewhere in the heartland, Israeli tanks shelled the Nuseirat and Bureij refugee camps, two of the eight historic refugee camps in the Gaza Strip. Israel says Hamas militants use civilian infrastructure as cover and to conceal their operations and weapons depots, a claim Hamas denies.
The terrorist group said it continued to attack Israeli forces and armored vehicles equipped with explosive devices, and was still able to fire a limited number of rockets into Israel.
On Tuesday, Islamic Jihad, a close ally of Hamas, said it had fired rockets into Israel in retaliation for what the jihadists called Israel's “massacre of civilians.”
The Israeli military said last week Hamas fired rockets from a buried launcher near two international humanitarian aid and food distribution warehouses, as well as the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). Israeli forces have since hit the sites.
Hamas-led militants sparked a war in the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, launching cross-border attacks into Israeli communities, killing 1,200 Israelis and foreigners and taking about 250 hostages, according to an Israeli count.
In retaliation, Israel has launched a relentless attack on the Gaza Strip, reducing the densely populated coastline to rubble, killing more than 39,600 Palestinians and injuring more than 91,500, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
The Hamas-led ministry does not differentiate between combatants and civilians in its death toll list.
