Israeli units are “expanding” their operations in the area around the city of Khan Younis in the south of the Gaza Strip, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on Friday, without providing details.
Hamas leaders are thought to be hiding in Khan Younis. The IDF reported finding explosives in the homes of Hamas members. Buildings with explosives had been destroyed, it said. Troops also found a number of tunnels and weapons.
Meanwhile, the Israeli military says it found and destroyed one of the hideouts of Hamas leader Yehya al-Sinwar near Gaza City, in the northern part of the sealed-off coastal strip.
Al-Sinwar is now believed to be in Khan Younis. The Hamas stronghold is currently also a focal point of Israel’s current ground offensive in the Gaza Strip.
The IDF said its operations were aimed at securing control of an area on the outskirts of the city, from where an attack was mounted on October 7 on the Nir Oz kibbutz directly across the border.
The IDF has instructed residents of the city to leave for Rafah to the south-west on the Egyptian border amidst a growing humanitarian crisis.
Virtually the entire population of Gaza – around 2.2 million people – is currently dependent almost exclusively on humanitarian aid, including food. The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) recently estimated that 40% of Gaza’s residents are at risk of famine.
On Friday, UNRWA called for the unhindered and safe access of humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip.
He called for humanitarian supplies to the Gaza Strip to be ensured to match the overwhelming needs including fuel, food, medicine, water and hygiene material also for those with specific needs like women, adolescent girls and people with disabilities.
The UNRWA chief objected to recent accusations made by Israel that the UN aid workers were failing in their tasks.
This is “baseless disinformation,” said Lazzarini, adding that “this is not the time to exchange accusations and promote misinformation.”
The Hamas-controlled Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip said 187 people had been killed in one day in fresh Israeli attacks. It added that 312 Palestinians had been injured. The figures took the number of Palestinians killed in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war to 21,507, with 55,915 others injured.
The figures cannot be confirmed, but the UN and other observers point out that the authority’s figures have been credible in the past.
Hours after the figures were released, South Africa accused Israel of genocide against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague.
The case, filed with the UN’s highest court, demands that Israel be ordered to cease its attacks in Gaza, the ICJ announced. South Africa claims the actions of the Israeli armed forces have a “genocidal character,” as they are aimed at the annihilation of the Palestinians in this area, an ICJ press release on the case reported.
South Africa, which has traditionally maintained good relations with the Palestinian Territories, says it is basing its complaint on the UN Genocide Convention, which was signed by both South Africa and Israel.
The ICJ judgements are binding, but the court has no power to enforce them. It can, however, call on the UN Security Council to take action in the matter.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Lior Haiat immediately and decisively rejected South Africa’s complaint.
“South Africa is cooperating with a terrorist organization that is calling for the destruction of the State of Israel,” Haiat said on X, adding that “Israel rejects with disgust the blood libel spread by South Africa and its application with this complaint” to the ICJ.
The lawsuit “lacks both factual and legal basis,” he wrote, adding that the ICJ and the international community should “completely reject South Africa’s baseless claims.”
The pro-Iranian Hezbollah movement claimed at least five attacks on Israeli posts near the Lebanese border, prompting Israeli retaliatory shelling and airstrikes that wounded two people, a Lebanese security source said.
Hezbollah said in a statement that it hit a crane carrying surveillance equipment in the Dovev Farms, inflicting casualties.
The Israeli army said it struck a Hezbollah terrorist cell responsible for launching anti-tank missiles in the area of Aitaroun and a missile launcher used to launch toward the area of Bar’am in northern Israel earlier Friday.
It added that Israeli fighter jets struck Hezbollah terrorist infrastructure in the area of Wadi Hamul in Lebanon.
And in the West Bank, four pedestrians were injured in a suspected car attack near a settlement in the West Bank, Israeli media and the Magen David Adom ambulance service reported.
Paramedics treated four people in their 20s. They were all conscious and one was in a “moderate condition,” the ambulance service said. Three others were slightly injured, it said. Israeli media reported that the victims were Israelis.
“Soldiers operating in the area neutralized the terrorist,” the IDF said. According to the media, the driver was shot dead. There was initially no information on his identity.
The already tense situation in the West Bank has worsened significantly since the start of the Gaza war following the Hamas massacre of some 1,200 people in Israel on October 7, the worst massacre in Israel’s history.
