Heavy Fighting in Gaza Halts Most Aid Delivery, Leaves Civilians with Few Places to Seek Safety

A picture taken from southern Israel near the border with the Gaza Strip on December 6, 2023, shows smoke billowing during Israeli bombardment in Gaza. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP)
A picture taken from southern Israel near the border with the Gaza Strip on December 6, 2023, shows smoke billowing during Israeli bombardment in Gaza. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP)
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Heavy Fighting in Gaza Halts Most Aid Delivery, Leaves Civilians with Few Places to Seek Safety

A picture taken from southern Israel near the border with the Gaza Strip on December 6, 2023, shows smoke billowing during Israeli bombardment in Gaza. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP)
A picture taken from southern Israel near the border with the Gaza Strip on December 6, 2023, shows smoke billowing during Israeli bombardment in Gaza. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP)

Intense fighting blocked relief workers from distributing food, water and medicine across most of the Gaza Strip, deepening the humanitarian crisis as Israeli forces battled Hamas militants Wednesday in a ground offensive that has brought some of the devastation and mass displacement seen in the north to the south.

As the focus of the offensive moves down the Gaza Strip and into the second-largest city of Khan Younis, it is further shrinking the area where Palestinians can seek safety and pushing large numbers of people, many of whom have been forced to flee multiple times, toward the sealed-off border with Egypt.

On the Gaza side of the border, makeshift shelters and family homes are already overflowing and many people are sleeping in the streets. On the other side, Egypt has refused any mass influx of refugees, saying it believes Israel will not let them back into Gaza and that the two countries' decades-old peace treaty would be undermined.

The UN says some 1.87 million people — over 80% of the population of 2.3 million — have already fled their homes. Many Palestinians fear they will not be allowed to return.

Much of the north, including large parts of Gaza City, has been completely destroyed, and Palestinians worry the rest of Gaza could suffer a similar fate as Israel tries to dismantle Hamas, which has deep roots in the territory it has ruled for 16 years.

Two months of Israeli bombardment and ground assaults have killed more than 16,200 people in Gaza — most of them women and children — and wounded more than 42,000, the territory’s Health Ministry said late Tuesday. It has said many are also trapped under rubble. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.

Israel has vowed to fight on, saying it can no longer accept Hamas rule or the group's military presence in Gaza after the Oct. 7 attack that triggered the war. Hamas and other militants killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took captive some 240 men, women and children in that attack.

An estimated 138 hostages remain in Gaza after more than 100 were freed during a ceasefire last week. Their plight, and accounts of rape and other atrocities committed during the rampage, have deepened Israel’s outrage and further galvanized support for the war.

PUSHED TO THE EDGE The war has been an unprecedented catastrophe for Palestinian civilians, eclipsing all four previous wars between Israel and Hamas, and their suffering is set to worsen as the offensive grinds on.

For the past three days, aid distribution — mainly just supplies of flour and water — has been possible only in and around Rafah, on the border with Egypt, because of fighting and road closures by Israeli forces, the UN’s humanitarian aid office said.

It said tens of thousands of people have fled into Rafah from Khan Younis and other areas, overwhelming already overcrowded shelters.

“You find displaced people in the streets, in schools, in mosques, in hospitals … everywhere,” said Hamza Abu Mustafa, a teacher who lives near a school-turned-shelter in Rafah and is hosting three families himself.

“The situation is extremely dire,” he said.

A Palestinian woman who identified herself as Umm Ahmed said the harsh conditions and limited access to toilets are especially difficult for women who are pregnant or menstruating. Some have taken to social media to request menstrual pads, which are increasingly hard to find.

“For women and girls, the suffering is double,” Umm Ahmed said. “It’s more humiliation.”

The humanitarian crisis gets even worse farther north, where aid supplies can no longer reach.

People in UN-run shelters in Khan Younis are fighting over food, said Nawraz Abu Libdeh, who is living in a shelter after being displaced six times. “The hunger war has started,” he said. “This is the worst of all wars.”

The World Food Program warned that the renewed fighting “will only intensify the catastrophic hunger crisis that already threatens to overwhelm the civilian population.”

In the central town of Deir al-Balah, the aid group Doctors Without Borders said fuel and medical supplies have reached “critically low levels” at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital. Up to 200 wounded people have been brought in every day since Dec. 1, when the weeklong truce expired, it said.

“Without electricity, ventilators would cease to function, blood donations would have to stop, the sterilization of surgical instruments would be impossible,” said Marie-Aure Perreaut Revial, the aid group’s emergency coordinator in Gaza. She said they are also running low on surgical supplies and equipment to stabilize broken bones.

Israel has barred entry of food, water, medicine, fuel and other supplies into Gaza, except for a trickle of aid from Egypt. Gaza has been without electricity since the first week of the war, and several hospitals have been forced to shut down for lack of fuel to operate emergency generators.

NO END IN SIGHT The Gaza Health Ministry’s death toll for Palestinians tracks with a figure released this week by the Israeli military, which said about 5,000 of the dead were militants, without saying how it arrived at its count.

The military says 88 of its soldiers have been killed in the Gaza ground offensive.

It accuses Hamas of using civilians as human shields when the militants operate in residential areas. But Israel has not given detailed accounts of individual strikes, some of which have leveled entire city blocks.

The Israeli military said Tuesday that its troops were “in the heart” of Khan Younis after what it described as “the most intense day” of fighting since the start of the ground operation five weeks ago, with heavy battles in the north as well.

Hamas’ continuing ability to fight in areas where Israel entered with overwhelming force weeks ago signals that eradicating the group without causing further mass casualties and displacement — as Israel’s top ally, the US, has requested — could prove elusive.

Even after weeks of bombardment, Hamas’ top leader in Gaza, Yehya Sinwar — whose location is unknown — was able to conduct complex ceasefire negotiations and orchestrate the release of scores of hostages last week. Palestinian militants have also kept up their rocket fire into Israel.



Lebanese Judge Questions Former Top Security Chiefs over Beirut Port Blast

FILE - In this Aug. 5, 2020 file photo, a drone picture shows the destruction after an explosion at the seaport of Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)
FILE - In this Aug. 5, 2020 file photo, a drone picture shows the destruction after an explosion at the seaport of Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)
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Lebanese Judge Questions Former Top Security Chiefs over Beirut Port Blast

FILE - In this Aug. 5, 2020 file photo, a drone picture shows the destruction after an explosion at the seaport of Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)
FILE - In this Aug. 5, 2020 file photo, a drone picture shows the destruction after an explosion at the seaport of Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)

The Lebanese judge investigating the massive 2020 Beirut port explosion questioned two former security chiefs on Friday, including a former head of the General Security Directorate who appeared in court for the first time since being summoned nearly four years ago, according to four judicial and two security officials.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. The hearings mark a rare breakthrough in the long-stalled probe, The Associated Press said.
Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim and former head of State Security Maj. Gen. Tony Saliba, are among several officials charged in connection with the blast that killed over 220 people. The specific charges have not been disclosed.​
Ibrahim appeared in court for the first time, where Judge Tarek Bitar questioned him about the operations of the General Security Directorate during his tenure and requested related documents, which Ibrahim’s lawyer is expected to submit next week.
Ibrahim, who headed the General Security Directorate between 2011 and 2023, is known for wide connections with local, regional and international figures, including the Iran-backed militant Hezbollah group, the Syrian government and Western nations, making him a key political mediator.
Ibrahim’s attorneys said in a statement that the former General Security chief appeared in court despite having previously filed a legal challenge against Judge Bitar and despite claiming that he was immune from prosecution.
His attorneys said he appeared as a “mark of respect for the families of the martyrs and victims, his belief in justice and truth, and his commitment to upholding legal procedures and the course of justice.”
Saliba, appearing in court for the fourth time, cooperated with the hearing, providing documentation pertaining to his role at State Security. After the hearing, Saliba described the proceedings as “positive" in a statement.
On Aug. 4, 2020, hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate detonated in a Beirut Port warehouse, killing at least 218 people, injuring more than 6,000 and devastating large swaths of the capital. The blast, one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history, caused billions of dollars in damage and sent shockwaves through the nation’s capital.
Following years of political obstruction, Bitar resumed the stalled investigation in mid-January, questioning port and customs employees, retired military officials, the former head of port security, the former army intelligence director, and 12 witnesses.
This development coincides with significant political changes in Lebanon, including the election of Joseph Aoun as president and the appointment of Nawaf Salam as prime minister. Both are perceived as outside the traditional political establishment, which includes many figures charged in the port explosion case.​
Several officials implicated in the investigation have accused Bitar of bias, refused to testify, and filed legal complaints against him.
Next week, Bitar is expected to question top former political leaders. Former Prime Minister Hassan Diab, who was in office at the time of the port explosion and is among those charged by Bitar, is scheduled to appear in court in May. His hearing will be followed by the questioning of four judges.
Meanwhile, a French delegation is expected to submit their findings from their investigation into the explosion later in April. France initiated its own probe into the explosion in 2020 after three French nationals were killed in the blast. However, French judges have faced obstacles accessing documents from the Lebanese investigation, which has been hindered by political interference.