The number of people killed in Gaza by Israeli military actions since the start of the war on 7 October has risen to 11,078, including 4,506 children, according to the Hamas-run health ministry on Friday. Another 27,490 Palestinians in Gaza have been wounded, it said.
Israel has revised downwards the death toll from last month’s Hamas attacks in the south of the country from 1,400 to about 1,200, a foreign ministry spokesperson said. The revision is “due to the fact that there were lot of corpses that were not identified and now we think those belong to terrorists … not Israeli casualties,” they said on Friday.
The largest hospital in Gaza, where up to 50,000 people are sheltering, is facing bombardment, the World Health Organization has said. Palestinian officials said Israel launched airstrikes on or near four hospitals and a school on Friday, killing at least 22 people. Graphic daytime videos posted online appeared to show screaming and bloodied people, including children, in the grounds of al-Shifa hospital in the heart of Gaza City. A WHO spokesperson said 20 hospitals in Gaza were out of action and that there was “intense violence” at al-Shifa.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PCRS) said Israeli forces opened fire on the intensive care unit at al-Quds hospital in Gaza City on Friday. One person was killed and 28 others – most of them children – were wounded in sniper fire by Israeli forces at the hospital, the organisation said.
An Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson has said the Israeli army are aware of the sensitivities of the hospitals in Gaza. “The IDF does not fire on hostages but if we see a Hamas terrorist we will kill him,” Lt Col Richard Hecht said in a press briefing on Friday.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has urgently called for the protection of patients, healthcare workers, medical facilities in Gaza. An ICRC statement warned that Gaza’s healthcare system has “reached a point of no return” amid escalating violence that have “severely” affected hospitals and ambulances working in the besieged Palestinian territory.
Thousands of Palestinians continued to flee south from northern Gaza on Friday a day after the White House announced that Israel would begin to implement four-hour “humanitarian pauses” in parts of the area to allow people to leave. IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said on Friday that more than 100,000 residents have fled south from Gaza City during the last two days.
On the ground, conditions continue to deteriorate during the sustained Israeli onslaught with heavy gunfire, explosions and the buzz of Israeli military drones heard as night fell over Gaza City on Friday. Despite the US announcement, there have been no immediate reports of a lull in fighting in northern Gaza.
The UN’s human rights chief, Volker Türk, has called for an investigation into what he described as Israel’s “indiscriminate” bombardment and shelling in densely populated areas in the Gaza Strip. “The extensive Israeli bombardment of Gaza, including the use of high-impact explosive weapons in densely populated areas ... is clearly having a devastating humanitarian and human rights impact,” Türk told reporters in Jordan.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said “far too many Palestinians have been killed” in the war. While Blinken said the US “appreciates” Israel’s steps to minimise civilian casualties, he said it was not enough. He said the US has proposed additional ideas to the Israelis, including longer “humanitarian pauses” and expanding the amount of assistance getting into Gaza.
Each recorded fatal Israeli airstrike on Gaza since 7 October has caused an average of 10.1 civilian deaths, a monitoring group has said, amid warnings that reported civilian casualty figures are likely to be an underestimate. The fatality average is far higher than in the three previous Israeli air campaigns in Gaza.
Crowds of people marched through the centre of Jenin in the occupied West Bank for the funerals of Palestinians killed during an IDF raid. As the Israeli offensive in Gaza continues, violence in the occupied West Bank is escalating. Nineteen Palestinians were killed across the territory on Thursday as clashes took place with the IDF.
Israel has killed a further seven Hezbollah fighters on its northern border with Lebanon, taking the total death toll of Hezbollah fighters to 78 since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October. The group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, will make his second speech this month on Saturday, setting out his latest thinking.
Israel is considering a deal for Hamas to release all civilian hostages held in Gaza, according to a report. Under one of the proposals being discussed, Hamas would release 10 to 20 civilian hostages in exchange for a brief pause in fighting, one official said. That could be followed by a release of about 100 civilians if terms are met.
Evacuations from the Gaza Strip into Egypt for foreign passport holders and for injured Palestinians requiring urgent medical treatment were suspended on Friday. The suspension was due to problems bringing medical evacuees to the Rafah crossing from inside Gaza, Reuters reported.
Four of the world’s biggest news organisations have vigorously denied any prior knowledge of Hamas’s deadly assault on Israel on 7 October. The Associated Press, Reuters, the New York Times and CNN issued robust statements saying such a suggestion was untrue, outrageous and reckless.
The organisers of the pro-Palestine march due to take place in London on Armistice Day believe “hundreds of thousands” of people will turn out for what they say will be one of Britain’s biggest days of mass protest.
Three women appeared in a British court on Friday and pleaded not guilty to terrorism offences after they were pictured at a pro-Palestinian march in London carrying photos of paragliders.
