The Japan Times - Israel launches fresh strikes on Gaza, Qatar warns of escalation

The new strikes came the morning after one of the deadliest days in the Gaza Strip since the truce came into effect on October 10, and after Israel launched a string of attacks targeting Hezbollah in Lebanon despite the nearly year-long ceasefire there.

The Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis in southern Gaza said four people were killed in the strikes early Thursday, after the territory's civil defence agency, which operates under Hamas authority, gave a lower toll of three dead.

The hospital said three from one family, including a one-year-old girl, were killed in a strike on a house east of Khan Yunis and one more person was killed in an air strike on the town of Abasan al-Kabira, also east of Khan Yunis.

A source at Gaza's Hamas-run interior ministry, who did not wish to be identified, said artillery fire was continuing in the Khan Yunis area.

Qatar, a key mediator in the Hamas-Israel war, condemned what it called the "brutal" Israeli air strikes, saying they were "a dangerous escalation that threatens to undermine the ceasefire agreement".

Gazans voiced despair at the fresh wave of attacks, saying it felt on the ground like the two-year war was continuing.

"We are worried about the war returning. The sound of artillery shelling and explosions from the demolition operations east of Gaza was terrifying last night," Lina Kuraz, 33, from the Tuffah neighbourhood, east of Gaza City, told AFP.

"My daughter kept asking me all night, 'Will the war come back?'. Every time we try to regain hope, the shelling starts again. When will this nightmare end?"

- 'The war hasn't ended' -

The so-called yellow line demarcates the boundary inside the Gaza Strip that Israeli troops have withdrawn behind, as part of the US-brokered ceasefire.

"We are aware of a strike east of the yellow line that was done to dismantle terror infrastructures," the Israeli military told AFP.

"We're not aware of the reported casualties. It's part of the regular IDF (Israeli military) operations east of the yellow line."

Israel has carried out repeated strikes against what it says are Hamas targets during the ceasefire, resulting in the death of more than 312 Palestinians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.

Wednesday's Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip left 27 dead, according to the civil defence agency.

"The war hasn't ended. Nothing has really changed," said Mohammed Hamdouna, 36, who was displaced from northern Gaza to a tent in Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Yunis.

"The intensity of the death toll has decreased, but martyrs and shelling happen every day. We are still living in tents. The cities are rubble, the crossings are still closed, and all the basic necessities of life are still lacking," he told AFP.

- Hamas appeals to mediators -

Hamas urged US President Donald Trump and other international mediators of the weeks-long truce to put pressure on Israel to stop its attacks.

"This violation requires serious and effective action from the mediators to pressure (Israel) to stop these violations and uphold the ceasefire agreement," Hazem Qassem, a spokesman for the Islamist movement, told AFP in Gaza City.

"The occupation is acting with blatant disregard to the mediators' efforts," he said.

The war was sparked by Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people.

Israel's retaliatory assault on Gaza has killed at least 69,546 people, according to figures from the health ministry that the UN considers reliable.

Israel also conducted several strikes in southern Lebanon on Wednesday.

The military said it targeted Hezbollah weapons storage facilities in several towns, and accused the Iran-backed group of trying to rebuild its capabilities.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday also drew a rebuke from Damascus and others in the region after visiting Israeli troops deployed in a buffer zone inside Syria.

H.Hayashi--JT