Israel’s military ordered tens of thousands of civilians to leave safe zones in eastern districts of the Gazan city of Khan Younis, warning of imminent “forceful” attacks against Palestinian armed groups it accused of using the area as cover for “significant terrorist activity and rocket fire” toward Israel. File photo by Haitham Imad/EPA-EFE
July 22 (UPI) — The Israeli military Monday ordered tens of thousands of civilians to leave safe zones in eastern districts of the Gazan city of Khan Younis, warning of imminent “forceful” attacks against Palestinian armed groups it accused of using the area as cover for “significant terrorist activity and rocket fire” toward Israel.
“The IDF is about to forcefully operate against the terrorist organizations and therefore calls on the remaining population left in the eastern neighborhoods of Khan Yunis to temporarily evacuate to the adjusted Humanitarian Area in Al-Mawasi,” the IDF said in a post on X that was, Palestinians said, almost immediately followed by heavy air and artillery strikes in and around Khan Younis.
The military texted, called and used broadcast media advising them that “embedded terrorist infrastructure” in the area made it dangerous to remain and that it had adjusted the Al-Mawasi humanitarian zone so that neighborhoods across a broad strip of the southern part were now no longer designated as safe zones.
At least 39 people, of whom 10 were children and women, were killed in the attacks, according to the enclave’s Hamas-run health ministry which appealed for people to come to the city’s Nasser Hospital to donate blood for the large numbers of people hurt in the attacks being brought in.
The bombardment began before the estimated 400,000 people affected, according to Palestinian Civil Defense, had time to respond to the instructions to leave.
On July 1, tens of thousands of people were forced to flee after they were ordered to evacuate eastern neighborhoods of Khan Younis as well as nearby towns and villages, also because of rocket fire that the IDF alleged had originated from areas where civilians were sheltering.
Despite United Nations warnings of overcrowding and sparse-to-no services, they were sent to a coastal humanitarian zone.
Monday’s attacks were the latest of a series in the past few weeks in or adjacent to humanitarian zones including a July 9 airstrike on a tented encampment for displaced Palestinians outside Khan Younis that killed at least 27 people.
The strike near the entrance to al-Awda school in the town of Abasan al-Kabira also injured at least 53 people with some in “critical” condition, the Hamas-run health ministry said.
Four days later, an IDF airstrike in al-Mawasi targeting a senior Hamas leader killed scores of civilians and injured 300.
In June, an Israeli airstrike on a U.N. school sheltering displaced Palestinians in central Gaza killed at least 27 people. An Israel Defense Forces warplane reportedly fired two missiles at classrooms on the top level of the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency school in the Nuseirat refugee camp.