THE Israeli military killed at least 31 more Palestinians in Gaza today, including 13 who were seeking food aid.

Residents of Gaza City, focus of a renewed offensive and planned occupation, reported “relentless bombardment” and said Israeli troops were systematically demolishing homes.

Footage showed sewage spreading through the Nasser hospital after an Israeli bombing raid damaged nearby pipes, raising the risk of infection, while reports that more Gaza residents are falling sick from drinking dirty water also emanated from the besieged enclave.

Settler attacks took place in the West Bank, with Israeli settlers felling olive trees belonging to Palestinian farmers in Abu Falah near Ramallah. In Duma, south of Nablus, settlers uprooted olive and grape trees, and warned Palestinians not to risk visiting their farms. Across the West Bank Israeli troops abducted 20 Palestinians.

Uproar over Israel’s escalating aggression spread, both in response to Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s approval of the E1 settlement on Thursday — one he promised would “bury” chances of a future Palestinian state — and at National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s visit to Palestinian resistance leader Marwan Barghouti in his Israeli prison cell, where he had himself filmed taunting the long-term prisoner, who has been held in prison since 2002, often in solitary confinement.

Mr Ben-Gvir told Mr Barghouti that Israel would “wipe out” anyone who “messes” with Israel or kills its citizens. “You will not defeat us,” he told the gaunt-looking inmate. The Palestinian Foreign Ministry said it was an “unprecedented provocation” and it would be raising it with the Red Cross, while Hamas said it was “a cowardly display that reveals the occupation’s fascism and hostility to all human values.”

Tel Aviv-based +972 Magazine reported that Israeli intelligence officers had briefed it about a special unit set up within the military, called the Legitimisation Cell, which was tasked with linking journalists with the Hamas resistance group, so as to justify killing them. They told the magazine the motive was “publicity, not security.”

Nearly 270 journalists and media workers have been killed since Israel invaded Gaza following the October 7 2023 Hamas attack on southern Israel. The military sought to justify the targeted killing of well known Al Jazeera journalist Anas al-Sharif and four colleagues last weekend by claiming he was a Hamas member.