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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Israel massacres Palestinian families in Gaza reprisal strikes</h1>
<p class="gmail-node__submitted">
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-author"><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/maureen-clare-murphy">Maureen Clare Murphy</a></span> -
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-publication-date"><span class="gmail-date-display-single">9 October 2023</span></span> </p>
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<p>Palestinians evacuate a victim from the rubble of a destroyed home in
Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, following an Israeli airstrike, 8
October.</p><small>
<span>DPA</span></small>
<p>Israel was shaking the ground in Gaza by pounding it from air, land
and sea overnight Sunday as a major confrontation that began with a <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/content/hamas-fighters-gaza-storm-israel-capture-and-kill-soldiers/38631">surprise assault</a> launched by Hamas stretched into its third day.</p>
<p>The official figure gave 700 fatalities in Israel but the news outlet Yediot Ahronot <a href="https://www.ynet.co.il/blogs/war2dayevening">said early Monday</a>
that it estimated there were 1,000 fatalities at present. The health
ministry in Gaza said that there were at least 413 fatalities in the
territory by the end of the day on Sunday.</p>
<p>Israel killed multiple members of several families in Gaza when it
bombed their homes over their heads without warning, rights groups said.</p>
<p>More bloodshed is all but guaranteed as Israel was reportedly set to
launch a ground invasion of Gaza – which has been under a punishing
blockade since 2007 and subjected to multiple large-scale assaults
during that time – in the <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-10-08/ty-article-live/over-250-israelis-killed-1-590-wounded-civilians-and-soldiers-held-hostage-in-gaza/0000018b-0cd2-d8fc-adff-6dfe855e0000?liveBlogItemId=640235470#640235470">next day or two</a>.</p>
<p>Palestinian human rights groups <a href="https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/21800.html">warned</a>
that statements by Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, “portend an unprecedented number of killings, with civilians
bearing the brunt.”</p>
<p>Those groups said that additional civilian casualties and destruction
were inevitable so long as Israel continued to evade accountability
“for the international crimes committed against the Palestinian people.”</p>
<p>Ahead of a closed Security Council meeting on Sunday, Riyad Mansour,
the Palestinian Authority representative to the United Nations, <a href="https://media.un.org/en/asset/k1p/k1pabdjm6z">said</a>
that “we came to the Security Council month after month warning of the
consequences of Israeli impunity and international inaction.”</p>
<p>“This is not a time to let Israel double down on its terrible
choices,” Mansour said. “This is the time to tell Israel it needs to
change course, that there is a path to peace where neither Palestinians
or Israelis are killed.”</p>
<p>He added that statements by Israel’s allies “about Israel’s right to
defend itself will be interpreted by Israel as a license to kill.”</p>
<p>Mansour said that the way to peace is not “through further entrenching oppression and occupation but by ending it.”</p>
<h2>US redirects aircraft carrier in support of Israel</h2>
<p>But the same Western states that have shielded Israel from
accountability at international fora lined up behind it following Hamas’
counteroffensive from Gaza against Israel’s assaults and settler
attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank, especially in Jerusalem
and the town of <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/tags/huwwara">Huwwara</a>.</p>
<p>The US <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/08/un-security-council-israel-palestinians-hamas-us/c379cbd6-6638-11ee-9753-2b3742e96987_story.html">demanded</a> that the Security Council condemn Hamas’ “heinous terrorist attacks” but failed to convince all 15 member states to do so.</p>
<p>Washington <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/pentagon-says-us-sending-munitions-equipment-to-israel-redirecting-aircraft-carrier/">said</a>
on Sunday that it would be “rapidly providing” the Israeli military
with additional equipment and weapons and was redirecting an aircraft
carrier to the eastern Mediterranean.</p>
<p>Hashem Safieddine, a senior Hizballah figure in Lebanon, which shelled an area of the country occupied by Israel on Sunday, <a href="https://twitter.com/AJArabic/status/1711135630044910015">warned</a> the US and Israel that the move would cause a regional escalation.</p>
<p>As of Sunday night, the Israeli army <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/idf-says-it-is-still-fighting-terrorist-infiltrators-in-israeli-territory/">said</a>
it was still engaged in battle with Palestinian fighters in now
militarized areas surrounding Gaza and claimed that it had killed
“hundreds” of fighters since Saturday.</p>
<p>Video showed widespread damage in Ashkelon, a coastal city in
southern Israel, after a barrage of rockets was fired from Gaza late
Sunday.
</p>
Despite lukewarm efforts by military figures to spin events as though
they were going in Israel’s favor, Israel was on Sunday still grappling
to come to terms with what can only be described as a colossal strategic
and operational failure.
Israeli authorities ordered residents of Sderot, an Israeli settlement
near Gaza, to remain in their homes after it was believed to be
infiltrated by Palestinian fighters on Sunday.
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<p>The military had issued <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/idf-calls-on-residents-of-sderot-mefalsim-to-stay-inside-homes-until-further-notice/">stay-at-home orders</a>
to residents of Kibbutz Mefalsim, a settlement near Gaza, as well as
Sderot earlier in the day. In total, some two dozen settlements near
Gaza were <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/idf-to-evacuate-civilians-from-towns-near-gaza-border-in-next-24-hours/">evacuated</a> by the military.</p>
<h2>Hundreds of fatalities in Israel</h2>
<p>Israel’s health ministry reported that the number of fatalities in
the country had risen to 700 and the number of injuries to 2,200. Media
reports said that 360 people were in critical condition at the end of
the night on Sunday.</p>
<p>Nationals of other countries were among the dead, including <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/nepal-confirms-10-of-its-citizens-killed-in-hamas-attack-on-israel/">10 citizens of Nepal</a> killed in Kibbutz Alumim, a settlement near Gaza.</p>
<p>Three UK nationals were <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/3-uk-citizens-are-either-missing-or-dead-their-families-say/">missing or dead</a>
as of Sunday, including one who was a soldier in the Israeli military. A
French national who was in the Israeli military was also reported
killed and several other citizens of the country were missing.</p>
<p>Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/blinken-says-working-to-verify-reports-of-us-hostages-in-gaza-would-be-a-priority-for-white-house/">said</a>
that Washington was “very actively working to verify” reports that
several Americans are among the dead and those captured and held in
Gaza.</p>
<p>Thailand <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/thailand-says-two-citizens-killed-in-hamas-assault-on-israel/">said</a> that two of its citizens were killed and that 11 of its nationals were <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/11-thai-nationals-being-held-by-hamas/">being held</a> by Hamas in Gaza.</p>
<p>A Cambodian student was also reportedly killed.</p>
<p>Some governments <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/japan-south-korea-condemn-hamas-incursion-as-seoul-calls-on-its-citizens-to-leave/">called</a> on their citizens to leave Israel and a few had evacuated their nationals from the country.</p>
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<p>Police and media at the site of a building destroyed during a rocket attack in Tel Aviv on 8 October.</p><small>
<span>Abir Sultan</span>
<span>EFE</span></small>
<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/10/08/world/israel-gaza-attack-hamas-news/1cc93e1a-71f3-53ab-a900-b981d4d6b74e">Several airlines</a>
canceled or drastically reduced flights to and from Tel Aviv, both
before and after its airport was targeted in a salvo of rocket fire from
Gaza on Sunday night.</p>
<p>Israeli authorities said that the bodies of 250 people were <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/zaka-says-more-than-250-bodies-collected-from-site-of-music-festival-attacked-by-hamas/">recovered</a> from the site of an all-night music festival that was stormed by Palestinian fighters at the outset of the attack on Saturday.</p>
<p>Video from the festival, held just a few miles from the besieged Gaza
Strip, shows rockets streaking across the sky as Palestinian
paragliders sail in:
</p>
<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67046444">Video appeared to show</a> the body of at least one festival attendee in the bed of a truck driven by militants in Gaza.
<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/08/world/middleeast/music-festival-israel-kidnapping-video.html">Another video</a> showed a festival-goer being taken alive by Palestinian fighters on motorbikes.</p>
<p>The families of missing Israelis <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/families-of-missing-israelis-in-joint-press-conference-give-us-answers/">held a press conference</a> on Sunday demanding information from the government and a meeting with officials.</p>
<p>Forty members of Israel’s Border Police were killed and 120 injured while 18 remain unaccounted for, <a href="https://twitter.com/AJArabic/status/1711102417255969225">according to</a> media reports.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-10-08/ty-article/israels-dead-civilians-soldiers-emergency-services-personnel-killed-in-war-with-hamas/0000018b-0de8-dc5d-a39f-9fecb5a30000">Dozens</a> of Israeli soldiers and military officers were killed, as well as dozens of police officers.</p>
<p>On Sunday, at least one Israeli motorist was <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-man-shot-dead-by-police-after-reportedly-being-mistaken-for-terrorist/">shot and killed</a>
near Ashkelon by police who mistook him for a Palestinian fighter.
Another Israeli was shot in similar circumstances but survived in
Sderot.</p>
<p>Israel <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/government-confirms-at-least-100-israelis-held-captive-in-gaza/">said</a>
that more than 100 people are believed to have been captured by
Palestinian fighters and taken into Gaza – a figure confirmed by a
senior Hamas official late Sunday. Foreign nationals are among those
being held in Gaza, including a man and a woman <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/two-mexican-citizens-believed-to-be-held-captive-in-gaza/">from Mexico</a>,</p>
<p>Some Israelis only learned of the fates of their family members through <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/woman-desperate-for-news-on-missing-cousin-her-two-young-children-spotted-in-gaza/">video footage</a> showing them in Gaza. One woman <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/sister-of-missing-idf-soldier-says-terrorist-answered-his-phone-said-he-was-dead/">told Israeli radio</a>
that her family was told that her brother, a missing Israeli soldier,
was dead after they called his mobile phone and a Palestinian fighter
answered.</p>
<p>Indeed, the Israeli military didn’t realize that Hamas fighters had
infiltrated Gaza-area settlements until after images and videos of
Israelis captured and brought to Gaza began circulating on social media.
</p>
Bodies remained strewn on a road at the entrance to Sderot, a city near
Gaza, for hours on Saturday, “evidence of the failure of the security
and rescue forces,” the Tel Aviv newspaper <em>Haaretz</em> <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-10-09/ty-article/.premium/bodies-piled-up-in-the-israeli-border-town-of-sderot-with-rocket-fire-as-a-soundtrack/0000018b-10f3-d3a8-afeb-93fb38590000">said</a> on Sunday.
<p>At another location near Sderot, <em>Haaretz</em> said, “car after car contained bodies that had been there for hours after the victims were shot to death.”</p>
<h2>Israel targets Gaza civilians in reprisal strikes</h2>
<p>Israeli leaders promised to use unprecedented force in Gaza in revenge for the surprise attack, with Netanyahu <a href="https://twitter.com/IsraeliPM/status/1710867504917008760">stating</a> that Israel’s offensive “will continue with neither limitations nor respite until the objectives are achieved.”</p>
<p>So far that has looked like the widespread targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure in Gaza.</p>
<p>The Israeli military said on Sunday that it had dropped 100 tons of
munitions on Shujaiya, a neighborhood east of Gaza City and the site of a
<a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/massacre-shujaiya-dozens-killed-israel-shells-eastern-gaza-city-photos">massacre</a> of 55 Palestinians by the military in July 2014.</p>
<p>Gaza’s health ministry <a href="https://twitter.com/AJArabic/status/1711090100698784031">reported</a>
more than 400 fatalities in Israeli reprisal strikes on the territory.
Among them were 78 children. Another 2,300 Palestinians in Gaza were
wounded.</p>
<p>Defense for Children International-Palestine <a href="https://twitter.com/DCIPalestine/status/1711072279440830575">said</a> that it had “confirmed the killings of at least 33 Palestinian children in Gaza” since Saturday morning.</p>
<p>The Palestinian Center for Human Rights, which is based in Gaza, <a href="https://pchrgaza.org/en/gaza-under-attack-civilian-objects-targeted-and-destruction-and-casualties-inflicted-by-israeli-retaliatory-strikes/">said</a>
that Israel’s retaliatory strikes targeted “dozens of civilian
objects,” bombing and destroying “residential towers and houses over
their residents’ heads.”</p>
<p>Palestinian human rights groups <a href="https://www.alhaq.org/advocacy/21800.html">called</a>
for “immediate and urgent intervention by the international community”
and blamed the escalation of violence on “the deliberate failure and
unwillingness … to address the root causes of the current situation in
Palestine.”</p>
<p>PCHR said that the Israeli military called or made public statements
ordering Palestinian residents of neighborhoods throughout Gaza to
evacuate their homes, “a measure that amounts to a form of forced
displacement.”</p>
<p>The United Nations <a href="https://ochaopt.org/content/escalation-gaza-strip-and-israel-flash-update-2">said</a>
that around 125,000 Palestinians in Gaza had been displaced from their
homes as of Sunday evening. Nearly 75,000 people were sheltering in 64
schools.</p>
<p>Medical patients were unable to travel to the West Bank, including
East Jerusalem, and Israel for scheduled appointments as the
Israeli-controlled checkpoints remained closed.</p>
<p>PCHR warned that Israel’s cuts to the supply of electricity of Gaza, a
form of collective punishment illegal under international law, “will
unequivocally cause a critical humanitarian catastrophe.”</p>
<p>The UN said that availability of electricity had been reduced to
three to four hours per day and that the Gaza power plant, the sole
source of electricity in the territory at present, “could run out of
fuel within days.”</p>
<p>PCHR <a href="https://pchrgaza.org/en/after-cutting-off-water-and-electricity-and-calling-for-evacuation-of-residential-areas-israeli-occupation-collectively-punishes-gaza-strip-population/">said</a> that Israeli companies, which provide 50 percent of Gaza’s water needs, had halted supply to the territory.</p>
<p>UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestine refugees, <a href="https://www.unrwa.org/resources/reports/unrwa-situation-report-1-situation-gaza">said</a>
it had suspended distribution of food assistance to nearly 113,000
families in Gaza. It said that two of its students were confirmed to be
among those killed.</p>
<p>The vast majority of Gaza’s population of more than two million
Palestinians are refugees from lands inside Israel, including areas
around the periphery of the coastal enclave.</p>
<p>One of its schools that was sheltering displaced people was directly hit, UNRWA said.
</p>
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights emphasized that Palestinians in
Gaza – one of the most densely populated places in the world – lack
protection “as there are neither public or private shelters nor safe
humanitarian corridors.”
<h2>Families obliterated in Gaza</h2>
<p>Since Saturday, several families in Gaza lost three or more members
in single Israeli strikes – a tactic used by Israel in previous assaults
on the territory.
</p>
A three-story home in Abasan al-Kabira east of Khan Younis in the
southern Gaza Strip was hit in an Israeli strike without warning on
Sunday. Al Mezan, another human rights group based in Gaza, said that 18
members of the Abu Daqqa family were killed in the strike, including
women and children.
<p>Seventeen people were killed in an Israeli strike on a home belonging
to the Abu Quta family, with “many people still buried under the
rubble,” human rights groups said on Sunday.
</p>
Six members of the Shaban family in Gaza City – two parents and their
four children – were killed in an Israeli attack on their home.
<p>Four members of the Abu Aoun family were killed in an Israeli strike
on Sunday, as were two parents and five children belonging to the Abu
Rakab family in al-Zawaida village in central Gaza.</p>
<p>Israel bombed “a densely populated area” where the office of Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar is located, PCHR said.</p>
<span>
<img src="https://electronicintifada.net/sites/default/files/styles/original_800w/public/2023-10/081023_rafah_mf_0011.jpg?itok=5h17KJqS×tamp=1696816162" width="410" height="273" alt="Men and boys stand with their arms crossed in prayer with the shrouded bodies of 13 people, three of them small children, inside a mosque" title="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;">
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<p>Palestinians mourn during the funeral for the Abu Quta family and
their neighbors, killed in Israeli strikes in Rafah, southern Gaza, on 8
October.</p><small>
<span>Mahmoud Fareed</span>
<span>APA images</span></small>
<p>Israel bombed the homes of other Hamas leaders, including Ghazi
Hammad, Salah Bardawil and Nizar Awadallah, the latter killing his son
Muhammad.</p>
<p>Six healthcare workers have been killed and four injured in Israeli
airstrikes that damaged seven medical facilities and nine ambulances,
the United Nations <a href="https://ochaopt.org/content/escalation-gaza-strip-and-israel-flash-update-2">said</a>.
</p>
Gaza’s chronically under-resourced hospitals appealed for donations of
blood as staff struggled to cope with the huge number of casualties.
<p>Israel bombed multiple banks, mosques and government buildings in the
territory and destroyed four commercial and residential towers on
Saturday and Sunday. One of the targeted buildings, Watan Tower, “serves
as a hub for internet providers in Gaza,” the BBC <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67045078">reported</a>.
</p>
<h2>Palestinian resistances presses forward</h2>
<p>Palestinian resistance groups launched fresh salvoes of rockets
towards Israel on Sunday as gunmen continued to operate inside
settlements near the Gaza boundary.</p>
<p>Islamic Jihad announced that it had launched a wave of rockets in
support of Flood al-Aqsa, the surprise offensive begun by Hamas on
Saturday morning.</p>
<p>The resistance faction <a href="https://t.me/sarayaps/16204">said</a> that it was holding 30 Israelis captive in Gaza and they would only be returned in the event of a prisoner exchange.</p>
<p>Ziyad Nakhaleh, the leader of Islamic Jihad, <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/islamic-jihad-leader-claims-terror-group-is-holding-over-30-israeli-hostages/">said</a>
that resistance fighters had humiliated Israel, which resorted to
calling Washington for help in the first hours of the offensive.</p>
<p>He said that the Israeli “army is weaker than many in the world
believe,” and urged the government to “surrender to this truth. The
easiest way to avoid losing more prisoners is to acknowledge defeat.”</p>
<p>Abu Obeida, the spokesperson for the Qassam Brigades, <a href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/in-new-message-abu-obeida-calls-on-all-palestinians-to-join-the-battle-video/">said</a> on Sunday that it had replenished its combat forces and sent additional troops inside Israeli territory.</p>
<p>“Our fighters, within the framework of the ongoing al-Aqsa Flood
battle, continue to engage in fierce and heroic clashes, fighting on
multiple fronts, inflicting casualties on the enemy,” he said.</p>
<span>
<img src="https://electronicintifada.net/sites/default/files/styles/original_800w/public/2023-10/071023_gaza_bt_009.jpg?itok=8wnImh5V×tamp=1696816162" width="410" height="273" alt="A fireball explodes next to a residential tower against a dark sky" title="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;">
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<p>An Israeli strike on a tower in Gaza City on 7 October.</p><small>
<span>APA images</span></small>
<p>Abu Obeida said late Sunday that Hamas was able to capture more
Israeli soldiers and take them into Gaza that day and that its fighters
were still engaged with Israeli forces in several areas and had reached
an area near Ashkelon.</p>
<p>He said that Hamas fighters were able to withdraw safely from a
military base housing the Israeli military intelligence Unit 8200 “after
the completion of their mission there and their liquidation of a large
number of enemy soldiers.”</p>
<p>Abu Obeida added that Hamas fighters in the battlefield documented
several cases in which “the enemy killed a number of its own prisoners
after our fighters were able to capture them.”</p>
<p>He was referring to the Hannibal Directive – military protocol that
authorizes massive firepower to prevent a captured soldier from being
taken alive. Israel <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/palestinian-killed-israel-uses-hannibal-directive-refugee-camp">employed that directive</a>
in Gaza in August 2014, killing dozens of Palestinian civilians when
Israeli forces aimed at locations where they believed a missing soldier
might have been held.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, in the West Bank, Al Jazeera reported that there were at
least two dozen shooting operations against Israeli positions in the
West Bank, where Palestinians held a general strike on Sunday.</p>
<p>Israeli forces killed <a href="https://english.wafa.ps/Pages/Details/138036">several Palestinians</a> in the West Bank on Sunday, including a <a href="https://english.wafa.ps/Pages/Details/138038">youth shot in the neck</a>
in Beita near Nablus, three people shot and killed during
confrontations at Qalandiya checkpoint near Ramallah, a youth in Hebron
shot during confrontations, and a youth shot in the neck during
confrontations at al-Jalameh checkpoint north of Jenin.</p> <h3>
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