Israel bombs house in northern Gaza Strip, killing 13 children during ongoing siege | Gaza News

At least 32 people, including 13 children, were killed in an Israeli attack on a house in the Jabalia refugee camp housing displaced Palestinians. Human rights groups are warning of an “extremely serious situation” in northern Gaza amid the weeks-long military siege.

“We now have a confirmed report that everyone in that house was killed. The last remains were removed from among the rubble in the last few hours,” said Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, adding that the attack occurred at 6 a.m.

Mahmoud said the attack occurred “suddenly and without prior warning.” According to a witness, the house was full of women and children who had been displaced from various parts of the northern Gaza Strip and ended up in this particular building.

“This is not about disarming specific groups, but about systematically destroying an entire area and turning it even more into a wasteland,” the Al Jazeera correspondent said, referring to the widespread destruction of the northern Gaza Strip through continuous Israeli bombardment and a military siege imposed on October 6th.

In another attack in Gaza City, an Israeli airstrike on a house in the Sabra neighborhood killed Wael al-Khour, a social ministry official, and seven other family members, including his wife and children, doctors and relatives said.

According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, a total of more than 50 people were killed and 164 injured in three attacks across the Gaza Strip on Sunday.

Israel has killed more than 43,000 Palestinians since it began its devastating war on Gaza following a Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 that killed more than 1,100 people and captured about 250 others.

The UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) said on Friday that women and children accounted for nearly 70 percent of the thousands of Palestinian deaths it was able to verify.

Weeks of military siege

Over the past 36 days, Israeli forces have besieged areas in northern Gaza, including Jabalia and Beit Lahiya, hampering access for already scarce humanitarian supplies.

Mahmoud Alsaqqa, OXFAM's head of food security and livelihoods in Gaza, said the “extremely serious situation” in the Gaza Strip continued to deteriorate. This came after the Committee of Global Experts warned that famine was looming in northern Gaza and action was needed within days to avert disaster.

“The residents of the northern Gaza Strip have nothing necessary for survival,” Alsaqqa told Al Jazeera from Deir el-Balah, as no aid or food shipments have reached the north for more than a month, apart from a small amount of medical supplies.

“The average number of trucks arriving is now less than 50. We used to have 500 trucks a day [before October 7, 2023]So you can imagine the enormous needs people have compared to what's coming in,” he said.

In parallel with the intensification of the bombing, the Israeli army has issued new waves of forced relocation orders for residents of the north, driving people from the north into the interior.

However, despite the catastrophic humanitarian conditions and almost daily shelling, many refuse to leave the country. Many of them told Al Jazeera that they were afraid to leave the area because of the risk of attack by Israeli soldiers.

The Israeli daily Haaretz accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the military of “carrying out an ethnic cleansing operation in the northern Gaza Strip.”

“The few Palestinians remaining in the area are being forcibly evacuated, homes and infrastructure have been destroyed, and wide roads are being built in the area and the separation of communities in the northern strip from central Gaza City is being carried out,” it said in an editorial.

As of November 4, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimated that approximately 100,000 people had been displaced from North Gaza Governorate to Gaza City within four weeks. According to OCHA, up to 95,000 people remained in northern Gaza.

The Israeli army says it wants to prevent Hamas fighters from regrouping there. But the depopulation of the northern part of the enclave and widespread destruction have fueled fears of war crimes.

On Thursday, the Israeli military sought to distance itself from comments made last week by an Israeli commander who said Israel was close to the “complete evacuation” of the north and that residents there would not be allowed to return after fighting ends .