Ella Osama Abu Dagga, 25 days old, is held by her great-aunt Suad Abu Dagga after she was pulled from the rubble earlier following an Israeli army airstrike that killed her parents and brother in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, March 20, 2025
ISRAELI attacks killed at least 85 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip today, according to local health officials.
Hours after that assessment, Hamas fired three rockets at Israel without causing casualties, in the first such attack since Israel broke the ceasefire with a surprise bombardment of Gaza on Tuesday.
The Israeli military meanwhile restored a blockade on northern Gaza, including Gaza City, that it had maintained for most of the war and announced an new ground operation near the already largely destroyed town of Beit Lahiya. Strikes have already killed dozens in the area over recent days.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have returned to what remains of their homes in the north after a ceasefire took hold in January.
Israel blames Hamas for the renewed fighting on the grounds it had refused to accept a new proposal that departed from their signed agreement.
The Trump administration, which took credit for helping to broker the ceasefire, has voiced full support for Israel.
More than 400 Palestinians were killed on Tuesday alone, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The military said three rockets were fired out of Gaza today, with one intercepted and two falling in open areas. Hamas claimed the attack and said it had targeted Tel Aviv.
One of the strikes on Gaza early today hit the Abu Daqa family’s home in Abasan al-Kabira, a village just outside of Khan Younis near the border with Israel.
It was inside an area the Israeli military had ordered evacuated earlier this week, encompassing most of eastern Gaza.
The strike killed at least 16 people, mostly women and children, according to the nearby European Hospital, which received the dead.
Those killed included a father and his seven children, as well as the parents and brother of a month-old baby who survived along with her grandparents.
“Another tough night,” said Hani Awad, who was helping rescuers search for more survivors in the rubble.
“The house collapsed over the people’s heads.”
Israeli ground troops advanced in Gaza on Wednesday for the first time since the ceasefire took hold in January, seizing part of a corridor separating the northern third of the territory from the south.
The announcement about passage to the south indicated troops will soon retake full control over what is known as the Netzarim corridor, stretching from the border to the Mediterranean Sea.
ROGER McKENZIE expounds on the motivation that drove him to write a book that anticipates a dawn of a new, fully liberated Africa – the land of his ancestors
While much attention is focused on Israel’s aggression, we cannot ignore the conflicts in Africa, stoked by Western imperialism and greed for natural resources, if we’re to understand the full picture of geopolitics today, argues ROGER McKENZIE
