Israeli strikes kill dozens of Palestinians in Gaza as fighting rages

Strikes come as Israeli ground forces claim to have invaded Lebanon

A Palestinian boy at the site of an Israeli strike on a house in Nuseirat camp in the central Gaza Strip, on October 1, 2024. Reuters

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Israel's military intensified air strikes on Gaza on Tuesday, killing dozens of Palestinians and injuring others, even as its forces moved against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Eleven people were killed, including a woman and a child, and others injured in a strike on a tent of displaced people west of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported. Three others were killed in an attack on a vehicle in the city. In Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, 12 people were killed by bombing, the majority of them were children and women..

In Gaza city, seven people were killed and others injured in an Israeli air attack on Shujaiya school in Tuffah neighbourhood. Gaza's civil defence said its teams recovered the bodies of the seven.

The Israeli army said it conducted a “precise” strike on a Hamas command and control centre, “which was embedded inside a compound that previously served as the Shujaiya UNRWA School”. Israel often accuses Hamas militants of hiding in schools where thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought shelter, but the group has repeatedly denied these allegations.

An unspecified number of people were killed in an attack on a home in the old village of Gaza. Israeli artillery shelled the neighbourhoods of Al Zeitoun and Al Sabra east of Gaza city, residential buildings in Rafah in south were also bombed, according to Wafa.

The armed wings of Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, and other smaller militant factions said in separate statements that their fighters attacked Israeli troops in several areas of Gaza with anti-tank rockets, mortar, and improvised explosive devices.

The renewed surge in violence in Gaza comes as Israel claimed it began a ground invasion in Lebanon, saying its paratroopers and commandos were fighting with the forces of Iran-backed Hezbollah.

The conflict follows assassinations of many figures in Hezbollah's leadership. The operation into Lebanon marks an escalation of the conflict in the Middle East between Israel and Iran-backed militants that threatens to drag in the US and Iran.

Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel almost a year ago, in support of its ally Hamas in the war in Gaza, which began after the militant group staged the deadliest assault in Israel's history on October 7.

The assault, in which Israel says 1,200 people were killed and more than 240 taken hostage, triggered the war that has devastated Gaza, displacing most of its 2.3 million population and killing more than 41,600 people, according to health authorities.

Some Palestinians said they feared that Israel's shift in focus to Lebanon could prolong the conflict in Gaza, which marks its first anniversary next week.