Gaza: 40 Palestinians die in overnight Israeli airstrikes

At least 40 Palestinians died on Friday after Israel launched an overnight strike targeting the Gaza Strip.

Medics in Gaza said that Israeli tanks pulled back from the region following the attack. Till now, 19 bodies have been recovered from the camp which is one of the enclave’s eight long-standing refugee bases.

Another strike in a house in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza killed 10 people, healthcare workers reported.

Others were killed in the northern and southern areas of the Gaza Strip, medics added. There was no fresh statement by the Israeli military on Friday, but on Thursday it said its forces were continuing to “strike terror targets as part of the operational activity in the Gaza Strip”.

The Israeli tanks, which were deployed in northern and western areas of Nuseirat on Thursday, were seen withdrawing from the area later but the military remained active there.

The Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said teams were unable to respond to distress calls from residents trapped in their homes.

Dozens of Palestinians returned on Friday to areas where the army had retreated to check on damage to their homes.

The head of the intensive care unit of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza was killed in an airstrike on Friday. It is one of the three functional hospitals on the northern edge of the Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military would stay stationed in Gaza for years to come, a cabinet minister said on Friday. “I think that we are going to stay in Gaza for a long time. I think most people understand that [Israel] will be years in some kind of West Bank situation where you go in and out and maybe you remain along Netzarim [corridor],” Avi Dichter, Israel’s minister for food security said.

The Israeli military’s prolonged presence in Gaza will ensure to thwarting of Hamas’ fresh recruits and streamline food and aid transfer in the region, Dichter said.

With inputs from Reuters