Israeli airstrikes on Gaza resume after weeklong truce with Hamas ends

Civilians in Gaza Strip urged to flee fighting, violence breaks out on Lebanon border

Israel’s war with Hamas erupted again Friday, as airstrikes hit houses and buildings in the Gaza Strip minutes after a weeklong truce expired. Health authorities in the besieged territory reported dozens of Palestinians killed and Israel dropped leaflets over Gaza City and southern parts of the enclave, urging civilians to flee to avoid the fighting.

Militants in Gaza resumed firing rockets into Israel, and fighting broke out between Israel and Hezbollah militants operating along its northern border with Lebanon.

The resumption of the war threatens to compound the suffering in Gaza. Some 2 million people — almost its entire population — are crammed into the territory’s south, where Israel urged people to relocate at the war’s start and has since vowed to extend its ground assault. Unable to go into north Gaza or neighbouring Egypt, their only escape is to move around within the 220 square kilometres.

Renewed hostilities also heighten concerns for about 140 hostages still held captive by Hamas and other militants, after more than 100 were freed during the truce. For families of remaining hostages, the truce’s collapse was a blow to hopes their loved ones could be the next out after days of seeing others freed.

Qatar, which has served as a mediator along with Egypt, said negotiators were still trying for a deal to restore the ceasefire. Israel and Hamas traded blame for ending the truce.

A day earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Israeli officials to do more to protect Palestinian civilians as they seek to destroy Hamas. Blinken met Friday with Arab foreign ministers at global climate talks in Dubai.

It was not clear to what extent Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will heed the appeals of the United States, Israel’s most important ally.

Netanyahu’s office said Friday that Israel “is committed to achieving the goals of the war,” including releasing the hostages and eliminating Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007.

In response to the U.S. calls, the Israeli military released an online map dividing the Gaza Strip into hundreds of numbered, haphazardly drawn parcels. It asked residents to learn the number of their location in case of an eventual evacuation. The map did not designate safe areas to evacuate to, and it was not clear how easily Palestinians could access it.

Hours into the renewed bombardment, Gaza’s Health Ministry said 109 people were killed and dozens wounded. Israel said it struck more than 200 Hamas targets.

Since the war began, more than 13,300 Palestinians have died, roughly two-thirds of them women and minors, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.

The toll is likely much higher, as officials have only sporadically updated the count since Nov. 11. The ministry says thousands more people are feared dead under the rubble.

The war began after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas and other Palestinian militants, who killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in southern Israel and took around 240 people captive. The New York Times reported Israel’s military was aware of Hamas’ plan to attack Israeli soil over a year before the devastating operation.

About an hour before the ceasefire was to expire early Friday, Israel said it intercepted a volley of rockets fired from Gaza. Minutes after it expired, the military announced a resumption of combat operations, and strikes soon began.

In leaflets dropped in southern Gaza, Israel urged people to leave homes east of Khan Younis, warning that the southern town was now a “dangerous battle zone.” Other leaflets warned residents of several neighbourhoods in Gaza City in the north to move south.

Hundreds of thousands of people fled northern Gaza to Khan Younis and other parts of the south earlier in the war, part of an extraordinary mass exodus that has left threequarters of the population displaced and facing widespread shortages of food, water and other supplies.

Strikes in Khan Younis hit an apartment in a housing development and destroyed a large building. Residents frantically searched the building’s rubble for survivors, and several wounded children were brought to a nearby hospital.

“We are women and children here. We have nothing,” said Fatima Nshasi, a relative of a family in the building, as women sobbed nearby. “We were going with life as usual, hoping the truce would be extended.”