Scores were killed during an Israeli incursion into the areas of Qizan Al-Najjar, Al-Manara and Ma’anin in the Khan Younis Governorate early on Wednesday morning, the Ministry said.
Several “victims are still under the rubble and in the streets, with ambulance and civil defense teams unable to reach them.”
Witnesses told the Anadolu news agency that the Israeli army carried out a sudden dawn incursion into eastern Khan Younis, opening direct fire at Palestinian homes, killing at least 40 Palestinians.
Anadolu cited a medical source at the Gaza European Hospital as saying 32 killed Palestinians were brought to the hospital as a result of the Israeli shelling in areas in the eastern part of Khan Younis.
Another source at the Nasser Medical Complex told Anadolu that eight victims had been recovered from under the rubble of homes that were hit. Rescue efforts continued for others who were still missing.
Israeli forces prevented rescue teams and ambulances from reaching the struck homes, as hundreds fled, the report added.
Dozens of homes, agricultural lands and infrastructure were severely damaged in the wake of the attack, after which the army withdrew from the area.
Cemetery, Homes Targeted
An Israeli airstrike targeted the Muscat School housing displaced Palestinians in eastern Gaza overnight killing at least 13, including children.
The Gaza Civil Defense said five more Palestinians were killed in an Israeli airstrike on the Al-Amal Orphanage which also shelters displaced people in central Gaza City.
The Civil Defense also said eight Palestinians were killed in an Israeli airstrike on the home of the Ghattas family in the Shejaiya neighborhood in eastern Gaza City.
On Wednesday afternoon, four Palestinians were killed and others injured after an Israeli military drone bombed a group of civilians in the Al-Sawarah area, west of Al-Nuseirat camp in the central Gaza Strip, the Palestinian WAFA news agency reported.
Also on Wednesday, an Israeli drone struck the Al-Sawwarah cemetery in central Gaza, resulting in casualties, reported the Quds News Network (QNN).
Staggering Death Toll
Israel continues to defy a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire and has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 41,689 Palestinians have been killed, and 96,625 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7, 2023.
Moreover, at least 11,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.
Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.
Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
Famine and Displacement
The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.
The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.
Later in the war, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians began moving from the south to central Gaza in a constant search for safety.