The United Nations says more than half a million people are starving in Gaza because not enough food has entered the besieged territory as Israel keeps up its blistering campaign of airstrikes and ground operations.
Palestinian officials said Friday that the death toll has now exceeded 20,000 — around 1% of the territory’s prewar population.
The Health Ministry in Gaza does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths. Israel says more than 130 of its soldiers have died in its ground offensive after Hamas raided southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people — mostly civilians — and taking about 240 hostages.
Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians are crammed into shelters and tent camps as winter descends, raising fears about the spread of disease. The U.N. Security Council has again delayed a vote on a new resolution to halt the fighting in some way, which would allow for an increase in humanitarian aid deliveries.
Currently:
— At least 5 US-funded projects in Gaza are damaged or destroyed, but most are spared
— Israeli police investigate prison guards in death of a Palestinian prisoner.
— The Israeli military campaign in Gaza now sits among the deadliest and most destructive in history, experts say.
— Find more of news agencies’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
Here’s what’s happening in the war:
RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Health officials in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip say more than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war between Israel and Hamas.
The figure, amounting to nearly 1% of the territory’s prewar population, is a new reflection of the staggering cost of the war, which in just over 10 weeks has displaced more than 80% of Gaza’s people and devastated wide swaths of the tiny coastal enclave.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said Friday that it has documented 20,057 deaths in the fighting. It does not differentiate between combatant and civilian deaths. It has previously said that roughly two-thirds of the dead were women or minors.
UNITED NATIONS — Members of the United Nations Security Council again delayed a vote on a now-watered down Arab-sponsored resolution for a halt in combat to allow for increased aid deliveries in Gaza. A vote, initially set for Monday, has been delayed each day since then. The United States now supports the resolution, but other council members said that because of the significant changes, they needed to consult their capitals before a vote, which is now expected on Friday.
Other countries support a stronger text in the resolution that would include the now-eliminated call for the urgent suspension of hostilities between Israel and Hamas.
Instead, the wording now calls “for urgent steps to immediately allow safe and unhindered humanitarian access, and also for creating the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.” The steps are not defined, but diplomats said, if adopted, this would mark the council’s first reference to a cessation of hostilities.
NIR OZ, Israel — An American family has donated a Torah that survived the Holocaust to relatives of a family whose members’ fate remains uncertain after they were taken hostage by Hamas in the Oct. 7 attack on their kibbutz in southern Israel.
Members of the Bibas family abducted from Nir Oz, along the Gaza border, include 11-month-old Kfir Bibas, his older brother Ariel, who is 4 years old, their mother Shiri and their father Yarden. Hamas has claimed the two children and her mother were killed in an Israeli strike. The Israeli military said it was investigating the claim.
“Ariel, Shiri, Kfir, we wait for your return here,” said Eli Bibas, the children’s grandfather, during a gathering held in front of their house on Wednesday where they received the Torah from a group of Jewish New Yorkers.
Around 20 residents of Nir Oz were killed in the Oct. 7 attack and some 80 were taken hostage out of a population of 400. Those seized from the kibbutz ranged from 9 months to 85 years old at the time they were taken. More than half were women and children.
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