JERUSALEM: The Israeli military on Saturday renewed its orders for Palestinian in the northern Gaza Strip to leave their homes and shelters as troops press on a weeklong offensive against militants.
Most of the fighting in the past week was centred in and around Jabaliya that was pounded by Israeli war jets and artillery. Residents said they have been trapped inside their homes and shelters. Palestinians in northern Gaza described heavy Israeli bombardment Saturday in the hours after airstrikes killed at least 22 people.
The US military said it conducted a series of airstrikes against multiple camps in Syria belonging to the Islamic State group. The US Central Command said the strikes on Friday would “disrupt the ability of ISIS to plan, organize and conduct attacks against the United States, its allies and partners, and civilians throughout the region and beyond.” It said battle damage assessments were underway and did not include civilian casualties.
There are some 900 US forces in Syria, along with an undisclosed number of contractors, mostly trying to prevent any comeback by the extremist IS group, which swept through Iraq and Syria in 2014, taking control of large swaths of territory.
The United Nations food agency said on Saturday that no food aid had entered northern Gaza since October 1.
The World Food Programme said that the primary border crossing into the war-ravaged area had been closed for about two weeks, warning that Israel’s ongoing ground operation has a disastrous impact on food security for thousands of Palestinians families there.
Israel ordered more evacuations and targeted a new location in northern Lebanon on Saturday, as a third UN peacekeeper was wounded in the escalating conflict.
At least five people were killed and 15 wounded in Israeli strikes across three different areas in Lebanon, according to a security source and a civil defence source. One of the targeted locations was in the town of Deir Billa in northern Lebanon, which had not been struck before.
Also on Saturday, Israel’s military ordered residents of 23 southern Lebanese villages to evacuate to areas north of the Awali River, which flows from the western Bekaa Valley into the Mediterranean.