Israel has stepped up its bombardment of central Gaza’s historic refugee camps, with heavy airstrikes hitting the area near the border with Egypt in the west and in the south-eastern city of Rafah. At least 13 people were killed in strikes overnight into Monday and early Tuesday, with some of the dead being children.
One of the dead was a journalist for the Palestinian Kan’an news agency, Mamdouh El-Fady, who was shot in the neck by an Israeli sniper in the southern city of Khan Yunis, according to several media reports and a statement by Beirut-based press freedom group SKeyes. An Israeli military spokeswoman said the attack was targeting a Hamas command post but did not say whether it hit any civilians.
The strikes have prompted thousands of displaced residents to flee the camps in a desperate attempt to reach safety. The military has been urging them to move to the crowded al-Mawasi refugee camp north of Rafah, but many are refusing, saying they are not safe there.
Many families have also turned to neighboring communities for shelter as a sign of growing desperation. They are leaving Gaza altogether, including those living in the primarily destroyed west of the enclave. Hundreds of people have arrived in the town of Jabaliya, northeast of Khan Yunis, and another 4,000 or so have flooded into Gaza City.
Amid the relentless bombardment, a United Nations official and several NGOs said that more than 1 million people in the territory were in urgent need of shelter. The Red Cross has been distributing food vouchers to displaced families so they can buy grain and other staples, but it is still not enough to feed everyone in the ravaged coastal enclave.
The violence came as a senior Israeli army officer warned that it was “hazardous” to push the battle into the densely populated center of the Gaza Strip and called for restraint from both sides. The official, Miri Eisin, a former colonel, said the heaviest fighting was expected in the urban centers of Gaza, where Hamas has extensive tunnels into Israel and can use booby traps and snipers to defend itself.
He also urged the international community to increase pressure on Israel to lift its blockade of the Gaza Strip and end its round-the-clock airstrikes. On Monday, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators called on President Joe Biden to ensure that planned U.S. aid to Israel is tied to assurances that the military will do more to reduce the number of civilian casualties.
The bombardment has sparked protests from groups in the United States and worldwide. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, accused Israel of destroying itself in its war on Hamas and said the country was “melting down before the eyes of the entire world.” NBC News’ Chantal Da Silva and Palestinian-American writer and correspondent David Noriega contributed to this report. Follow NBC News on Twitter and Facebook. Copyright 2018 NBC Universal, Inc. All rights reserved.