Israel levels Gaza district, hits Orthodox church as invasion looms
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[October 20, 2023]
By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Emily Rose
GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Israel levelled a northern Gaza district on
Friday after giving families a half-hour warning to escape, and hit an
Orthodox Christian church where others had been sheltering, as it made
clear that a command to invade Gaza was expected soon.
The Secretary General of the United Nations visited the crossing between
the besieged Gaza Strip and Egypt, and said humanitarian aid must be
allowed across as soon as possible.
Israel has vowed to wipe out the Hamas Islamist group that rules Gaza,
after its gunmen burst through the barrier fence surrounding the enclave
on Oct. 7 and rampaged through Israeli towns and kibbutzes, killing
1,400 people, mainly civilians.
"You see Gaza now from a distance, you will soon see it from inside. The
command will come," Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told troops gathered
at the Gaza border on Thursday.
Israel has pounded Gaza with air strikes and put the enclave's 2.3
million people under a total siege, banning shipments even of food, fuel
and medical supplies. Since Oct. 7, at least 4,137 Palestinians have
been killed and 13,000 wounded in Gaza in Israeli strikes since Oct.7,
the Palestinian health ministry said.
The U.N. says more than a million have been made homeless.
The Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, the main Palestinian Christian
denomination, said Israeli forces had struck the Church of Saint
Porphyrius in Gaza City, where hundreds of Christians and Muslims had
sought sanctuary.
Video from the scene showed a wounded boy being carried from rubble at
night. A civil defense worker said two people on upper floors had
survived; those on lower floors had been killed and their bodies were
still in the rubble.
"They felt they would be safe here. They came from under the bombardment
and the destruction, and they said they would be safe here but
destruction chased them," a man cried out.
Gaza's Hamas-run government media office said 18 Christian Palestinians
had been killed. There was no immediate word from the church on the
final death toll. It said targeting churches that were used as shelters
for people fleeing bombing was "a war crime that cannot be ignored".
The Israeli military said part of the church was damaged in a strike on
a militant command centre and it was reviewing the incident.
'EVERYTHING I DREAMT OF DESTROYED'
Israel has already told all civilians to evacuate the northern half of
the Gaza Strip, which includes Gaza City. Many people have yet to leave
saying they fear losing everything and have nowhere safe to go with
southern areas also under attack.
In Zahra, a northern Gaza town, residents said their entire district of
some 25 apartment buildings was razed to the ground.
They received Israeli warning messages on their mobile phones at
breakfast, followed ten minutes later by a small drone strike that
hammered the message home. After another 20 minutes, F-16 warplanes
brought the buildings down in huge explosions and clouds of dust.
"Everything I ever dreamt of and thought that I have achieved was gone.
In that apartment was my dream, my memories with my children, and my
wife, was the smell of safety and love," Ali, a resident of the
district, told Reuters by phone, declining to give his full name for
fear of reprisals.
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Israeli tanks seen on a road near Israel's border with the Gaza
Strip, in southern Israel October 20, 2023. REUTERS/Violeta Santos
Moura
The United Nations humanitarian affairs office said more than
140,000 homes - nearly a third of all homes in Gaza - have been
damaged, with nearly 13,000 completely destroyed.
The south of the enclave has also been regularly hit. Rescue workers
were combing through the wreckage of a house in the main southern
city Khan Younis looking for survivors. One carried the limp body of
a child.
"We don’t want to receive aid, we want the destruction and the
killing of children in their sleep to stop. We are tired," said
neighbor Joumana Khreis.
A man wept while a medic comforted him at the side of a road next to
two dead bodies wrapped in white shrouds. The bodies were later held
aloft by marchers who carried them through the Khan Younis streets.
AID STILL HELD UP
International attention has focused on getting aid to Gaza through
the one access point not controlled by Israel, the Rafah crossing to
Egypt. U.S. President Joe Biden, who visited Israel on Wednesday,
emerged with a promise from Israel to allow limited shipments from
Egypt provided that the aid is monitored to prevent any from
reaching Hamas.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres toured the checkpoint on the
Egypt side and called for a meaningful number of trucks to enter
Gaza every day and checks to be quick and pragmatic.
"We are actively engaging with all parties to make sure conditions
for delivering aid are lifted," he said.
Western leaders have so far mostly offered support to Israel's
campaign against Hamas, although there is mounting unease about the
plight of civilians in Gaza.
Biden delivered a televised speech on Thursday calling for billions
of dollars in U.S. military aid for Israel to fight Hamas. But he
also said: "We can't ignore the humanity of innocent Palestinians
who only want to live in peace and have opportunity."
The conflict is also spreading to two other fronts - the West Bank
and the northern border with Lebanon.
The defence ministry ordered residents of the largest Israeli town
near the Lebanese border, Kiryat Shmona, to evacuate. Clashes at the
border between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah movement have been the
deadliest since a full-blown war in 2006.
In the West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said 13 people
were killed including five children when Israeli troops raided and
called in air strikes on the Nur Shams refugee camp near Tulkarm.
The territory, where Palestinians have limited self rule under
Israeli military occupation, has seen the deadliest clashes since
the second intifada uprising ended in 2005.
(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza, Washington and Jerusalem
Bureaus; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Philippa Fletcher)
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