At least 44 killed in new Israeli strikes against Hamas

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DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Gaza’s Ministry of Health says at least 44 people have been killed from Israeli airstrikes into Gaza early Tuesday morning.

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Israel launched a new wave of airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, saying it was striking Hamas targets in its heaviest assault in the territory since a ceasefire took effect in January.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the strikes because of a lack of progress in ongoing talks to extend the ceasefire. It was not immediately clear if the operation was a one-time pressure tactic or if the 17-month-old war was being resumed altogether.

“This comes after Hamas repeatedly refused to release our hostages and rejected all offers it received from the U.S. presidential envoy, Steve Witkoff, and from the mediators,” Netanyahu’s office said.

Taher Nunu, a Hamas official, criticized the Israeli attacks. “The international community faces a moral test: either it allows the return of the crimes committed by the occupation army or it enforces a commitment to ending the aggression and war against innocent people in Gaza,” he said.

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In Gaza, explosions could be heard at various locations and ambulances were arriving at Al Aqsa Hospital in central Gaza.

The strikes came two months after a ceasefire was reached to pause the war. Over six weeks, Hamas released roughly three dozen hostages in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners.

But since the first phase of the ceasefire ended two weeks ago, the sides have not been able to agree on a way forward with a second phase aimed at releasing the nearly 60 remaining hostages and ending the war altogether. Netanyahu has repeatedly threatened to resume the war, and early this month cut off the entry of all food and aid deliveries into the besieged territory to put pressure on Hamas.

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The war erupted with Hamas’ Oct 7, 2023, cross-border attack, which killed some 1,200 people and took 250 others hostage. Israel responded with a military offensive that killed over 48,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, and displaced an estimated 90% of Gaza’s population. The territory’s Health Ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and militants, but says over half of the dead have been women and children.

“Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength,” Netanyahu’s office said.

The ceasefire had brought some relief to Gaza and allowed hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians to resume to what remained of their homes.

But the territory is coping with vast destruction, with no immediate plans to rebuild. A resumption of the war threatens to reverse any progress made in recent weeks toward halting Gaza’s humanitarian crisis.

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While the ceasefire largely halted the fighting, Israel has left troops in Gaza throughout the past two months and continued to strike targets, claiming that Palestinians were trying to carry out attacks or approaching troops in no-go zones.

A number of strikes earlier Monday killed a total of 10 people, according to Palestinian officials.

Two strikes in central Gaza hit around the urban refugee camp of Bureij. One struck a school serving as a shelter for displaced Palestinians, killing a 52-year-old man and his 16-year-old nephew, according to officials at nearby Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where the casualties were taken. The Israeli military said it struck militants planting explosives.

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An earlier strike killed three men in Bureij. The Israeli military said the men were trying to plant an explosive device in the ground near Israeli troops. Gaza’s Hamas-led government said the men were collecting firewood.

In Syria, meanwhile, Israel seized a zone in the south after the fall of longtime autocrat Bashar Assad in December. Israel says it is a preemptive security measure against the former Islamist insurgents who now run Syria, though their transitional government has not expressed threats against Israel.

Strikes in the southern Syrian city of Daraa killed three people and wounded 19 others, including four children, a woman and three civil defence volunteers, the Syrian civil defence agency said. It said two ambulances were damaged. Other strikes hit military positions near the city.

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The Israeli military said it was targeting military command centres and sites in southern Syria that contained weapons and vehicles belonging to Assad’s forces. It said the materials’ presence posed a threat to Israel.

In Lebanon, Israel said it struck two members of the Hezbollah militant group in the southern Lebanese town of Yohmor, who it said were “observation operatives.” Lebanon’s state news agency reported there were two people killed in the strike and two wounded.

The military later said it carried out further strikes on Hezbollah sites in Lebanon, without specifying where. A U.S.-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah went into effect in late November ending the 14-month war between the two sides, and each side has repeatedly accused the other of violating the deal.

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Since the ceasefire in Gaza began in mid-January, Israeli forces have killed dozens of Palestinians who the military says approached its troops or entered unauthorized areas.

Still, the deal has tenuously held without an outbreak of widespread violence. The ceasefire’s first phase saw an exchange of some hostages held by Hamas in return for the freeing of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been trying to mediate the next steps in the ceasefire.

Israel wants Hamas to release half of the remaining hostages in return for a promise to negotiate a lasting truce. Hamas instead wants to follow the ceasefire deal reached by the two sides, which calls for negotiations to begin on the ceasefire’s more difficult second phase, in which the remaining hostages would be released and Israeli forces would withdraw from Gaza. Hamas is believed to have 24 living hostages and the bodies of 35 others.

— AP reporter Ghaith Alsayed in Damascus, Syria, contributed to this report.

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