Israel kills dozens as it intensifies attacks on Gaza by air, land and sea

Health Ministry reports ‘large numbers’ of killed and wounded rushed to hospital as a result of nonstop Israeli bombardment.

The Israeli military is conducting intense assaults across the Gaza Strip by air, land and sea, killing dozens of people and spreading fear among its war-weary displaced population.

Dozens of air raids hit the besieged territory on Saturday, particularly in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, homes west of the city of Rafah in the south and multiple areas in Gaza City to the north.

The Ministry of Health in Gaza said “large numbers” of killed and wounded were arriving at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, the majority of whom are children and women.

“Dozens of injured people are lying on the ground, and medical teams are trying to save them with the basic medical capabilities they have available,” it said, adding that it is short on medicine and food, and that its main generator has stopped functioning due to a lack of fuel.

In a news briefing, a spokesman for the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital said at least 55 killed people and dozens wounded were brought to the barely functioning medical facility following the Israeli attacks on Deir el-Balah.

The spokesman added that there were still “a lot of” bodies and wounded people that remained on the streets.

Communications were affected amid the intense bombardment, but reporting from inside the “overwhelmed” hospital via a telephone call, Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary said the situation is tense, with terrified people on the street not knowing where to turn.

“There are explosions happening every minute. Ambulances are transferring the wounded to the hospital where we are trapped. It’s chaos inside the hospital. There are children among the wounded,” she said.

In a short statement, the Israeli military said its forces were “targeting terrorist infrastructure in the area of Nuseirat”. It later announced its forces rescued four captives during the operation in Nuseirat. The four, who were taken into Gaza after the Hamas-led attack in southern Israel on October 7, were in “good medical condition”, the military said.

The Gaza Government Media Office said in a statement that the Israeli army had launched “an unprecedented brutal attack” on the Nuseirat refugee camp, “leaving dozens of martyrs and wounded in the streets” and continuing “its aggression against all areas of the Central Governorate”.

Also in central Gaza, at least six Palestinians from one family were killed by Israeli forces after they shelled their home in the Bureij refugee camp in the morning.

Dozens of air raids targeted the southern areas of Gaza City, with witnesses reporting that entire residential blocks were wiped out, while gunships bombarded the area near its fishing port.

The Israeli military is only intensifying its deadly campaign in Gaza after an attack on Thursday killed about 40 people sheltering at a United Nations-run school in the Nuseirat refugee camp, where some 6,000 displaced Palestinians were sheltering.

It claimed it killed 17 “terrorists” in that attack, but the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said in a condemning statement that the “school turned shelter” was targeted without any warning and those responsible must be held to account.

Hamas accused the Israeli military of providing “false information” about the 17, saying at least several of those announced killed are still alive.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

Freed hostage Andrey Kozlov in Ramat Gan, Israel. (Reuters)

Four hostages rescued alive in Gaza operation, Israel says

• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the operation’s leaders, highlighting their “creativity and boldness.”
• Freed hostage Noa Argamani: ‘I haven’t spoken Hebrew for so long’
• Health officials say 55 killed as eyewitness describes ‘terrifying’ bombing

          The Washington Post 08-06-2024

Israel’s Military Says It Rescued Four Hostages

In the town of Nuseirat in central Gaza, where the hostages were rescued, residents reported intense Israeli bombardments and a hospital official and local media reports said dozens of people were killed.

Aaron Boxerman New York Times 08-06-2024

Here is the latest news on the freed hostages.

Israeli forces rescued four hostages who had been held since the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7 in an operation in central Gaza on Saturday, the military said. The news was met with jubilation in Israel, where fear for the fate of the roughly 120 remaining captives has been rising after eight months of war.

Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, told reporters that the rescue mission took place at about 11:00 a.m. on Saturday morning when forces located the four hostages in two separate buildings where they were being held by Hamas militants in Nuseirat. He said the Israeli forces there came under fire but managed to safely extract the hostages in two helicopters.

The announcement about the hostages came shortly after the Israeli military said it was conducting an operation targeting militants in Nuseirat, where intense combat was reported on Saturday. The wounded and bodies of those killed by Israeli airstrikes on Nuseirat during the rescue operation are filling the wards and corridors of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central town of Deir al-Balah near Nuseirat, a hospital spokesman said.

The freed hostages — named as Noa Argamani, 26; Almog Meir Jan, 22; Andrey Kozlov, 27; and Shlomi Ziv, 41 — were kidnapped by Palestinian militants from the Nova music festival during the Oct. 7 attack. All four are in good medical condition and have been transferred to a hospital in Israel for further examination, the Israeli authorities said in a statement.

Roughly 250 people in Israel were abducted during the Oct. 7 assault, according to the Israeli government, including women, older people and young children. Some 105 of them were released during a weeklong truce in November. Israeli troops have brought home the bodies of around 19 others, including at least three unintentionally killed by Israeli troops.

Despite an eight-month military campaign in Gaza, Israel has struggled to free its hostages in bold rescue operations. The successful recovery of the four hostages raises the total number to seven, including a special forces raid in February in the southern Gazan city of Rafah that freed two Israelis held by Hamas.

Here’s what else to know:

• Ms. Argamani’s abduction, in particular, became a symbol of the brutality of the Oct. 7 attack, in which an estimated 1,200 people were killed, according to Israeli officials. In a video from the scene, Palestinian assailants can be seen driving Ms. Argamani away on a motorcycle as she cried for help and reached out to her boyfriend, Avinatan Or, as he was marched away.

• Benny Gantz, a key member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli war cabinet who has threatened to depart amid serious differences over the war in Gaza, indefinitely postponed an expected news conference planned for Saturday evening, citing “recent events.”

• Yoav Gallant, Israel’s defense minister, hailed what he called a “complex operation” by Israeli soldiers, special forces and intelligence, who he said had “operated with extraordinary courage under heavy fire.”

• Israel and Hamas have continued negotiations on a cease-fire that would see the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza. The United States has sought to pressure both sides to reach an accord after President Biden gave a speech outlining what he called a phased Israeli truce proposal.⍐