Palestinians in north Gaza describe ‘real life horror movie’

Displaced Palestinians use a dry path in an inundated camp, following heavy rainfall north of Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on November 24, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas militants. Agence France-Presse

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories — Gazans on Thursday described a “real life horror movie” in the Gaza Strip’s north as Israeli air strikes continued across the Palestinian territory, a day after a ceasefire began in neighboring Lebanon.

Vowing to stop Hamas from regrouping in northern Gaza, Israel on October 6 began an intensive air and ground operation in Jabalia and then expanded it to Beit Lahia.

“We are living in a real life horror movie, the situation is indescribable, the Israeli bombing doesn’t stop from the air or on the ground,” said Umm Ahmad Lubbad, 52, from Beit Lahia.

READ: Northern Gaza’s hospitals come under attack again

She told AFP by phone thay she was scared to leave her house, but that she would go if the Israeli army asked people to evacuate their homes.

“We don’t know where we will go exactly,” she added.

Abu Muhammad Al-Madhoun, displaced from Jabalia camp to the central Gaza Strip, said said the situation was “catastrophic”.

“It is getting worse every day,” he said, adding: “The bombing does not stop.”

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a truce with Hezbollah in Lebanon on Tuesday, he vowed to “intensify” pressure on Islamist movement Hamas in Gaza.

READ: ‘Full-blown famine’ in north Gaza, World Food chief warns

The health ministry in the Hamas-run territory said at least 37 people were killed on Thursday across the territory by Israeli air strikes.

Hossam Abu Safiyeh, director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in the north, described the situation there as a “tragic and very difficult”.

“The occupation (Israel) does not allow anything to be brought into the area. The targeting has not stopped around the hospital,” he said.

The hospital is one of only two still functioning, and only partially, in the region north of Gaza City.

Hospitals in the Palestinian territory have been hit multiple times since the outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas, triggered by the militant group’s unprecedented attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

The Israeli army says Hamas uses buildings such as hospitals as bases, hiding its activities among civilians, a claim Hamas and medical workers deny.

The military said on Thursday that 34 patients from Kamal Adwan and Al-Awda hospitals had been transferred to safe facilities in Gaza.

The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, Philippe Lazzarini, said on X that “the ongoing military operation in northern Gaza has uprooted 130,000 people”.

The agency, UNRWA, said in a separate post that “the conditions for survival (in northern Gaza) are diminishing for the 65,000-75,000 people estimated to remain there”.

Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,207 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed 44,330 people in Gaza, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers reliable.