Israeli strikes in Gaza kill at least 100, local health officials say

By LIAM STACK and BILAL SHBAIR

Israeli strikes killed at least 100 people across the Gaza Strip overnight, local health officials said, in what appeared to be the deadliest day since Israel and Hamas agreed on a ceasefire three weeks ago.

The strikes began late Tuesday after Israel’s government accused Hamas of violating the truce by failing to return the bodies of dead captives and by attacking Israeli forces in Rafah in southern Gaza. The Israeli military said one of its soldiers had been killed in the Rafah attack.

On Wednesday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said “dozens of Hamas commanders” had been killed in the strikes.

The military said the ceasefire resumed at 10 a.m. local time. But Wednesday evening, the Israeli military released a statement saying it had attacked a weapon storage site in northern Gaza. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Health officials in Gaza said the Israeli strikes overnight had killed at least 100 people and injured around 250 more.

Munir al-Bursh, director-general of Gaza’s Health Ministry, said 35 children were among those killed. He said hospitals in the enclave “are still facing a severe shortage of resources and a significant lack of medicines.” The ministry’s data does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

Gaza’s Civil Defense emergency rescue service also said that at least 100 people had been killed.

Riyad Rihan, 21, said he was sleeping in a roadside tent in the central city of Deir al-Balah when explosions began nearby.

“I woke up to my children screaming,” said Rihan, who fled the northern town of Jabalia earlier in the war. “Pieces of shrapnel came through the ceiling of my tent.”

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he supported the strikes in Gaza, saying Israel “should hit back” when its soldiers were killed. But he added that “nothing is going to jeopardize” the ceasefire, which is based on a peace plan he proposed last month.

“Hamas is a very small part of peace in the Middle East, and they have to behave,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One during a trip to South Korea. He added, “If they’re not good, they’re going to be terminated.”

In a statement, Hamas accused Israel of seeking to undermine the ceasefire and criticized the U.S. administration.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani of Qatar, a key mediator in the conflict, said the flare-up of violence in Gaza had been “very disappointing and frustrating for us to see.”

Speaking at an event in New York, he said that the strikes were “a significant event” but that Qatar and other mediators, in particular the United States, “remain focused on making sure the ceasefire itself holds.”

At Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis in Gaza on Wednesday, a New York Times reporter saw women weeping over the bodies of children. Dr. Ahmed al-Farra, an official there, said the hospital had received the bodies of 21 people killed in the strikes, including 13 children.

The strikes came after a week of escalating tensions over delays to the exchange of deceased captives between Israel and Hamas, a key plank of the fragile ceasefire deal.

Tensions boiled over Tuesday when gunmen in Gaza attacked a group of Israeli soldiers in Rafah. The military said militants had opened fire on Israeli troops who were dismantling a Hamas tunnel in an area under Israeli military control in eastern Gaza.

Also on Tuesday, the Israeli military released a drone video that it said showed Hamas was trying “to create a false impression” about its efforts to locate deceased captives.

Hamas denied involvement in the Rafah attack. It has insisted it is acting in good faith to locate and return the remains of people it took from Israel during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that ignited the war.

The drone footage showed what the Israeli military said were Hamas members faking the discovery of a deceased captive as observers from the Red Cross watched. The aid group said its staff members were unaware that a body had been moved before their arrival. “It is unacceptable that a fake recovery was staged,” the Red Cross said in a statement.

When asked about the video Tuesday, Hamas referred The New York Times to an earlier statement that accused Israel of creating false pretexts for military action.