Jan-Mar
Jan 1: As the world welcomes the new year with celebrations and fireworks, Palestinians in Gaza are running for their lives, trying to find shelter and save themselves from indiscriminate Israeli bombing, Al Jazeera reports. It says central Gaza — designated a safe zone — was pounded repeatedly overnight.
Amid rising casualties and injuries, the Palestinian health minister says the situation at hospitals across the enclave is “totally catastrophic”. Medical facilities are operating way beyond their capacities and experiencing shortages in medical supplies. Israel only allows a fraction of the aid required into the strip and its relentless bombing prevents aid distribution.
Meanwhile, Yesh Din, a human rights group says 2023 was the “most violent” year for Palestinians in the West Bank with the violence spiking after Oct 7.
Jan 2: Israeli bombs continue to rain down on Gaza hitting several neighbourhoods in Khan Younis and Rafah. Shelling is also reported around the Jabalia refugee camp in the north. The Palestine Red Crescent says five people were killed in an Israeli strike on its headquarters in Khan Younis. The death toll in the enclave since Oct 7 now stands at 22,000.
Around 10,000 cancer patients at the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital in Gaza are without critically needed medicine after the facility was forced out of service by the Israeli army, the head of the hospital tells Anadolu Agency. These patients are facing “compelling and inhumane circumstances”, he adds.
In another report, the Financial Times says Israeli aggression has shattered all the elements in Gaza that underpinned normal life — schools, libraries, bakeries and other businesses. Gazans, who are already dazed and terrified from the war, fear there will be nothing to return to once the guns fall. Many say Israel’s ultimate goal is to make the strip uninhabitable and force them to abandon the land they call home.
Jan 3: A five-day-old baby is among those killed in an Israeli attack near the Al-Amal Hospital in Gaza’s Khan Younis, the Palestine Red Crescent says, adding that the strikes have left the thousands of Palestinians sheltering inside the facility terrified. The WHO calls the bombardment “unconscionable”.
As attacks continue in Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah, Rafah is now housing more than a million displaced Gazans. “People are sleeping in the streets, out in the open. Some of them have not been able to even follow the evacuation orders,” the UN relief agency says. Separately, it says more than 85pc people in Gaza began the new year in displacement.
Jan 4: The health ministry in Gaza says more than 125 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli ground and air attacks on southern Gaza in the last 24 hours, where medical groups report that the health system is teetering on the brink of collapse. They say intensive care units are working at 250pc capacity. The focus of the bombing is Rafah and Khan Younis — areas that were once designated safe by the Israeli military.
TRT World, quoting the Gaza media office, says Israel has bombed Gaza with more than 45,000 missiles and bombs that weigh over 65,000 tonnes.
Jan 5: Israel’s ground and air blitz has killed almost 1pc of Gaza’s 2.3m population, the health ministry says. Artillery shelling continues in the vicinity of Palestine Red Crescent’s Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis while Israeli ships hit areas in central Gaza.
The UN humanitarian chief says the enclave is becoming “uninhabitable” amid the ongoing Israeli assault, with famine “right around the corner” as Palestinians struggle with record food insecurity.
Meanwhile, the database of human rights organisation Law for Palestine reveals evidence of 500 instances of Israeli officials advocating for genocide against Palestinians in besieged Gaza, TRT World reports. “Our documentation encompasses over 500 incitements of violence and genocidal incitement, appearing in the forms of social media posts, television interviews, and official statements from Israeli politicians, army personnel, journalists, and other influential personalities,” it states.
Jan 6: Children in Gaza continue to be killed in Israeli bombing, but not just that, their lives are increasingly at risk from preventable diseases and lack of food and water, says Unicef. A doctor associated with MSF tells Al Jazeera that children are “dying in every way possible” in Gaza.
Separately, a report by Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor says more than 90,000 people — who constitute about 4pc of Gaza’s population — are either dead, wounded or missing due to Israel’s continuous air, land and sea attacks. Hundreds of bodies that cannot be recovered remain on roads, particularly in areas where the Israeli army has conducted ground incursions, it adds.
The government media office in Gaza also claims that the Israeli army has exhumed 1,100 graves in the Tuffah cemetery and stolen 150 bodies. The Israeli forces respond by saying they are checking claims but don’t elaborate any further. Days later, in an interview with US news outlet NBC, an Israeli army spokesperson admits to digging up graves.
Jan 7: Israeli forces kill Hamza Dahdouh — the son of Al Jazeera’s Wael Dahdouh — and fellow journalist Mustafa Thuraya in an air raid in southern Gaza. The health ministry says at least 64 Palestinians have been killed in overnight Israeli attacks. Along with killing and injuring tens of thousands, these Israeli strikes also hinder rescue operations.
On the other hand, the Gaza media office says the Israeli army looted money and other valuables from displaced families in the enclave. There is no comment from Israeli authorities on the accusations.
Unicef says more than 10 children per day, on average, have lost one or both of their legs in Gaza since Israel began its indiscriminate bombing in the enclave. As the strip continues to lose its hospitals, the Palestinian health ministry adds that Israeli drones are targeting the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, which if put out of service would be a “death sentence” for thousands of wounded patients in central Gaza.
Jan 8: Israel continues to bombard central and southern Gaza, killing as many as 73 Palestinians and wounding 99 others over the past 24 hours, the health ministry says. The death toll in the enclave since Oct 7 has now topped 23,000.
Meanwhile, the WHO says it has been unable to reach hospitals in northern Gaza since Dec 26 as it did not receive any safety guarantees from Israeli forces. “Heavy bombardment, movement restrictions, and interrupted communications are making it nearly impossible to deliver medical supplies regularly and safely across Gaza, particularly in the north,” it says, adding that suffering in Gaza is increasing with every hour without adequate healthcare.
According to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, only five out of the 22 healthcare centres are operational across the enclave. Meanwhile, Al Jazeera reports hundreds of patients from the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital are missing. The facility has been under attack for days.
Jan 9: Massive Israeli airstrikes are reported around the Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza while constant artillery shelling is taking place in Khan Younis and Rafah, Palestinian journalists say. In the last 24 hours, at least 57 bodies have been brought to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where patients are being treated on floors.
Amid these desperate conditions in Gaza, the Israeli Supreme Court has rejected a request from international media organisations to allow independent access for journalists to report in besieged Gaza. With Palestinian journalists being killed every day, this ruling will prevent key information from coming out of the besieged enclave.
Defence for Children International says at least 8,000 Palestinian children were killed by Israeli forces in Gaza and 121 in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem in 2023, calling it the “year of genocide”.
Jan 10: An Israeli strike on agricultural land near Rafah kills at least four children, Al Jazeera reports. An Israeli attack targeting a residential home within three miles of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital kills at least 40 Palestinians and leaves scores wounded. Concerns are also mounting for the Nasser Hospital as Israeli forces are pushing deeper into southern Gaza. Without sufficient supplies, the hospital is already overwhelmed with patients.
Meanwhile, a UN official says 45pc of Gazans are experiencing severe hunger with families in some areas going 24 hours without eating. “This aggravates charges of genocide, as physical destruction can be achieved through starvation,” says Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
Jan 11: The health ministry in Gaza says Israeli forces have carried out 10 mass killings in the strip in the last 24 hours, causing 112 deaths and 194 injuries.
According to a new report by Oxfam, the daily death toll of Palestinians — an average of 250 people a day — in the enclave has surpassed the killing of any other major conflict during this century. For comparison, the charity provided a list of average deaths per day in other conflicts since the turn of the century: 96.5 in Syria, 51.6 in Sudan, 50.8 in Iraq, 43.9 in Ukraine, 23.8 in Afghanistan, and 15.8 in Yemen.
Jan 12: Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, one of the last few medical facilities in the strip that has come under bombing by Israel in recent days, plunges into darkness after it runs out of fuel. The lives of hundreds of patients at the hospital are now in critical danger. There is also a communication blackout in the enclave due to Israeli bombardment.
The UN humanitarian chief says Israel has waged its campaign in Gaza “with almost no regard for the impact on civilians”, adding that Palestinians may never be able to return to northern Gaza due to widespread destruction. The UN agency further states that Israel only allowed three of 21 life-saving aid deliveries into the enclave.
According to a new report by Save The Children, 10,000 children or 1pc of the total child population in Gaza have been killed in the Israeli onslaught. It says children surviving the war are “enduring unspeakable horrors, including life-changing injuries, burns, disease, inadequate medical care and losing loved ones.” The death toll in Gaza now stands at 24,000.
Jan 13: Fourteen Palestinians, including a two-year-old girl, are killed in an overnight Israeli strike on a house in Rafah — which was earlier designated a safe area. According to the health ministry, 135 people have been killed and 312 wounded in the last 24 hours. An Al Jazeera journalist reporting from the enclave describes it as “a very bloody day”.
The UN humanitarian office says Israel is constantly blocking humanitarian aid convoys into northern Gaza. “They have been very systematic in not allowing us to support hospitals, which is something that is reaching a point of a level of inhumanity that for me is beyond comprehension,” it says.
In its latest update, the Palestinian health ministry says every one in 20 Gazans are dead, wounded or missing. It says Israeli aggression on Gaza has resulted in massacres and widespread destruction. It adds that only six ambulances are operating in the enclave due to relentless bombardment.
Jan 14: Israel’s bombardment of Gaza enters its 100th day. According to the health ministry, every 1 out of 100 Palestinians in the enclave have been killed during this time while every 3 out of 100 people have been injured. It also accuses Israel of “deliberately targeting hospitals” in the enclave.
Hospitals, protected under international humanitarian law, have been hit repeatedly by Israeli strikes in Gaza.
Meanwhile, the enclave’s media office says 800,000 Gazans are facing death because of “Israel’s policy of starvation and thirst against the enclave”. The UN too highlights that the clock is “ticking fast towards famine” in Gaza, adding that children in Gaza are “begging for a sip of water or a loaf of bread”.
Jan 15: More than 100 Palestinians are killed in overnight Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip, the media office says. The death toll now stands at 24,000.
Meanwhile, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor says the lack of drinking water in Gaza is tantamount to being handed a “death sentence”. “The systematic and deliberate Israeli bombing of water wells and sources, in addition to the lack of fuel necessary to operate water conversion, “has resulted in a “horrific tragedy”, the statement says.
In the West Bank, the UN says Israeli forces have killed 30 Palestinians just during the handful of days of 2024. The number includes seven children.
Jan 16: Israel blows up a family home in Rafah, killing an entire family of 12, including children. The health ministry says more than 150 Palestinians have died or are wounded in an overnight bombing. The vicinities of Nasser and Al-Amal hospitals have also been hit.
According to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, an entire generation in Gaza is traumatised due to Israel’s actions in the enclave and will take years to heal. Human rights experts say every single person in Gaza is facing serious hunger. “Israel is destroying Gaza’s food system and using food as a weapon against the Palestinian people,” they say.
Jan 17: Israel continues its attacks across Gaza, where at least three children are killed in the shelling of a home in Rafah, Al Jazeera reports. Thousands of displaced Palestinians have on the other hand fled from Khan Younis’ Nasser Hospital in panic after Israeli shelling.
A shipment of medical supplies meant for Israeli captives in Gaza and Palestinians has entered the strip as a part of a deal between Tel Aviv and Hamas. However, residents are not sure if it will reach the designated areas as Israel continues to bomb Gaza from north to south. Furthermore, a communications blackout for the past five days is hampering aid efforts.
Jan 18: Information coming out of the Palestinian enclave is slowing down due to an ongoing communications blackout. Israeli attacks continue though, with a particular focus on central and southern Gaza, reports Al Jazeera. Overnight shelling of a house in Rafah has left 16 Palestinians, including children, dead.
Inside hospitals across Gaza, where there’s an extreme shortage of medical staff, patients are “waiting to die”, a WHO coordinator says. Separately, healthcare workers report a 300pc increase in miscarriages across the enclave due to the overwhelmed healthcare facilities, lack of supplies, hunger and continuous Israeli bombardment.
Jan 19: The UN says Israeli authorities have denied access for nearly 70pc of aid deliveries to northern Gaza, which is facing dire humanitarian conditions. Over 77 Palestinians have been killed in overnight Israeli airstrikes while the Palestine Red Crescent reports “intense artillery shelling” near the Al-Amal Hospital.
Meanwhile, Unicef says 135,000 children across the Gaza Strip under the age of two are at “severe risk of malnutrition”. “The situation of pregnant women and newborns in the Gaza Strip is beyond belief, and it demands intensified and immediate actions,” the agency’s spokesperson says.
Jan 20: The death toll in Gaza is nearing 25,000 as the health ministry says 165 more Palestinians were killed over a 24-hour period. Several Palestinians are killed in Israeli strikes on a civilian car in Rafah and the Jabalia and Bureij refugee camps.
UN Women says two mothers are killed in Gaza every hour. “The generational trauma inflicted on Palestinian people over these 100 days and counting, will haunt us all for generations to come,” the agency’s chief says in a statement.
An Al Jazeera investigation reveals that Israeli soldiers executed at least 19 civilians in Gaza City in December. The news outlet says it spoke to witnesses who recounted how women and girls were separated from their families, beaten and strip-searched.
Meanwhile, a CNN investigation, using satellite imagery, finds Israeli forces desecrated 16 cemeteries in Gaza, “leaving gravestones ruined, soil upturned, and, in some cases, bodies unearthed”.
Jan 21: The death toll in Gaza reaches a grim milestone, surpassing 25,000 with 165 killings in the last 24 hours, the health ministry says. Heavy firing and fighting continue in Khan Younis, near the Nasser Hospital. A fire also breaks out at the Jabalia refugee camp after an overnight attack in the area.
Amid the mounting toll, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres denounces Israel for the “heartbreaking” deaths of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, calling it unacceptable to resist statehood for the Palestinian people. “Israel’s military operations have spread mass destruction and killed civilians on a scale unprecedented during my time as secretary-general,” he says.
Jan 22: At least 65 Palestinians are killed in the besieged southern city of Khan Younis by Israel, Al Jazeera reports, quoting medical sources. There are also reports of “systematic destruction” of the city where thousands of civilians are sheltering in schools, shelters and camps.
The Palestine Red Crescent says the Israeli military is attacking its ambulance centre, preventing first responders from reaching the wounded in Khan Younis, where the military has intensified its ground assault.
In a statement on Telegram, the Gaza media office says Israeli forces bombed Al-Aqsa University Shelter, University College Accommodation, Khalidiya School Shelter, Al-Mawasi School Shelter and Khan Younis Industry Shelter where 30,000 displaced people are taking refuge.
“[Israelis] claimed they were safe centres and called on citizens to take refuge in them, then committed a massacre that left many martyrs. This comes within the framework of a genocidal war launched by the occupation against civilians, children and women, in the Gaza Strip,” it says.
Jan 23: Nasser Hospital once again comes under fire as Israeli forces push to encircle Khan Younis, creating brutal conditions for medical workers and threatening to knock out one of Gaza’s few remaining functional hospitals. The UN humanitarian chief says medics are working at the facility while debris keeps falling on their heads. Near the Al-Amal Hospital, PRCS says Israeli drones are attacking anyone moving around the facility.
Medical sources tell Al Jazeera that Israeli strikes have killed at least 40 people in Khan Younis since the start of the day.
The World Food Programme says only 30pc of the required aid is entering Gaza, saying that one of the issues behind this is the delay in inspecting aid by Israeli authorities. Due to this, there is a risk of having “pockets of famine” in the enclave.
Jan 24: The Palestine Red Crescent Society says Israeli forces have imposed a “blockade” on the Al-Amal Hospital, which is already struggling to function. On the other hand, UN officials say its shelter in Khan Younis was struck by Israeli tank shells, killing at least nine people and injuring 75. The casualties are expected to climb.
In a report, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor terms Israel’s targeting of displaced people in the areas of Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis — previously designated as a safe zone — “a perpetuation of its ongoing genocide”. The group says this targeting serves as further evidence of Israel’s attempt to implement its forced displacement plan and give the people of Gaza the impression that there is nowhere safe for them to live.
Jan 25: Hundreds of people queuing for aid in northern Gaza, where the food situation is “absolutely horrific”, are attacked by an Israeli strike. As a result, 20 Palestinians are killed and over 150 wounded in what is called a “war crime”. The Israeli military says it is looking into the reports.
In the southern part of the strip, Israeli forces have surrounded Nasser and Al-Amal hospitals, forcing displaced people into a new desperate scramble for safety. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) says there is a risk of a complete shutdown of medical operations in the enclave. In the last 24 hours, Israeli attacks have killed 200 Palestinians and injured 370, the health ministry says.
Jan 26: Relentless Israeli strikes continue to pound refugee camps and public facilities across Khan Younis with at least 183 Palestinians killed and over 300 wounded, the health ministry in Gaza says. The death toll in the enclave since Oct 7 is now at 26,000.
Al Jazeera reports that Israeli snipers shot Palestinians leaving the Al-Amal Hospital, despite some of them carrying white flags. At the Nasser Hospital, the Israeli siege continues for the fifth day. According to the spokesman for the Gaza health ministry, the facility has completely run out of food, anaesthetics and painkillers.
Jan 27: The US and other countries halt funding for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees after Israel alleges some of its members were involved in the Oct 7 Hamas attack. While the agency has promised to probe the accusations, the cutting of funds will put the lives of millions of Palestinians in Gaza at risk.
In the last 24 hours, 174 Palestinians have been killed and 310 wounded, the health ministry says, adding that the total number of slain journalists has now reached 120. Doctors Without Borders expresses concerns that heavy Israeli bombing in southern Gaza has collapsed vital medical services at the Nasser Hospital. “Between 300 and 350 patients remain at Nasser Hospital, unable to evacuate because it is too dangerous and there are no ambulances,” it says.
Jan 28: After Israeli forces issue fresh evacuation orders, Palestinians in Khan Younis flee to Rafah where they find people sleeping in the streets and tents flooded with sewage.
Meanwhile, the besieged Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis has run out of oxygen supplies. Israeli attacks around hospitals have made the provision of medical care nearly impossible and halted most ambulance services, cutting the wounded off from medical care. A similar situation persists at the Nasser Hospital as well.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, the head of humanitarian policy and advocacy at Save the Children says Israel’s war on Gaza is killing children at “rates unparalleled in recent crises”.
Jan 29: Israeli strikes over the last 24 hours have killed 165 Palestinians and wounded 290, the Gaza health ministry says. At least 10 people are killed in Israeli artillery fire on a UN-run school in Gaza City.
Bombings also continue around the Al-Amal and Nasser hospitals. “People have lost their ability to think, their ability to feel, they are moving like robots, it is just a matter of time before Israel sends tanks into here as well, there is no place safe,” says a Palestinian sheltering at the facilities.
Jan 30: After days of siege, Israeli authorities storm the Al-Amal Hospital and demand doctors and displaced Palestinians to evacuate, the Palestine Red Crescent says. It adds that a security employee at the facility has been shot dead by the Israeli military.
A BBC analysis reveals more than half of Gaza’s buildings have been damaged or destroyed in the Israeli offensive since Oct 7.
In the West Bank, Israeli forces, disguised as civilians and medical workers, kill three Palestinians inside a Jenin hospital, claiming they were members of an armed group planning an attack. Palestinian authorities denounce the raid as an “assassination”. The UN calls it a “planned extra-judicial killing”.
Jan 31: As the Israeli siege of the Al-Amal and Nasser hospitals continues, the Gaza health ministry says food at the medical centres has run out. A video by the Palestine Red Crescent shows medical staff burying a 45-day-old baby girl in the courtyard of the al-Amal Hospital. In the north, Doctors Without Borders says Israeli forces have rejected aid deliveries “systematically”.
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has accused Israeli troops of killing at least 30 civilians “execution-style” — blindfolded and hands tied. It says their bodies were discovered in a mass grave in northern Gaza.
In Rafah, children line up with pots to get some food. Most of them, however, return empty-handed as aid remains minimal in the besieged enclave.
A report by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz says IDF commanders, without obtaining permission, have ordered soldiers to set fire to unoccupied homes in Gaza. “After the structure is set on fire along with everything inside it, it is allowed to burn out until it is rendered useless,” the report says.
Feb 1: After bombing it for days, Israel says out loud that it will continue its assault in Gaza on to Rafah, where more than half of the enclave’s population has been crammed after Israeli evacuation orders. Thousands of Palestinians have nowhere to flee now.
In the last 24 hours, around 119 people have been killed in Israeli strikes, the health ministry says, with heavy shelling reported near the Al-Amal and Nasser hospitals in Khan Younis. Both the medical facilities have been under Israeli siege for at least 10 days.
The death toll in the strip since Oct 7 now stands at 27,000. Health officials add that in Khan Younis, more than 30,000 displaced people at schools have no water, food or baby formula as aid distribution is impossible due to Israel’s constant bombing.
Feb 2: At least 112 Palestinians have been killed and nearly 150 wounded in Israeli attacks in the last 24 hours, the health ministry says. Palestine Red Crescent says Israeli forces directly fired at the Al-Amal Hospital, which is under siege, killing a staff member and three displaced people.
According to Unicef, at least 17,000 children in the enclave are unaccompanied or have been separated from their families, who have either been killed in Israeli bombing or injured. “Each one has a heartbreaking story of loss and grief,” says the agency’s spokesperson.
Meanwhile, the World Food Programme says Israel has barred convoys delivering food assistance from reaching northern Gaza throughout the week, even as the prospect of famine stalks the strip. Humanitarian officials also consistently report that Israeli authorities are overwhelmingly rejecting aid delivery efforts, especially to northern Gaza, Al Jazeera reports.
Feb 3: UN officials say Rafah is becoming a “pressure cooker of despair”. The area sheltering more than a million Palestinians, previously designated safe, is now on Israel’s radar. Overnight attacks in the area have killed at least 24 people, the health ministry says.
Feb 4: Israeli forces killed 30 Palestinians in a supposedly “safe area” in the central part of Gaza in the past 24 hours, authorities say. “The occupation army targeted the safe homes of citizens with direct bombardment from military jets. It also bombed a mosque in the same area, which led to the killing of many people,” the enclave’s media office says.
Hospitals across the strip are in a desperate condition. Shelling and artillery firing are reported in the vicinity of the European Hospital in Khan Younis. At the Al-Amal Hospital, a humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding with medical supplies at zero stock and depleted food. The medical facility has been under Israeli siege for days, with hundreds of patients inside it.
Feb 5: As Israel continues to press one of the most destructive military campaigns in modern history, the UN says over 100,000 Palestinians have been killed, wounded or are missing in Gaza. Defence for Children, a rights group, says more than 12,100 children have been killed in the coastal enclave since Oct 7 and the number is likely to increase, given that 8,000 people are still underneath the rubble.
On the other hand, the Israeli military’s main focus now is Khan Younis where its forces are demolishing entire neighbourhoods, one after the other, Al Jazeera reports. It adds that a number of people at the Al-Amal Hospital were given safe passage today to move further south. While some left, there are still elderly and wounded trapped inside the facility.
Feb 6: A six-year-old girl in Gaza is missing for over a week now, AFP reports. The last time Hind Rajab was heard from, she was surrounded by dead relatives and trapped in the family’s care after it came under Israeli fire in Gaza City.
Over the last 24 hours, at least 107 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks, the health ministry says. Israeli forces have also killed six Palestinian police officers who were securing the passage of an aid truck in Rafah. Witnesses say the officers had been securing the passage of a flour truck when an Israeli airstrike hit their car, ripping the passengers to pieces.
On the other hand, doctors at the European Hospital in Khan Younis say they have to prioritise patients who have a higher chance of survival because of a shortage of medical staff and supplies — a situation created by Israel’s blockade which falls under the Genocide Convention.
Amid a looming Israeli incursion into Rafah, the UN says “everything possible” must be done to avoid an attack in the southern city of Gaza, warning that it could lead to “large scale” loss of life. “Under international humanitarian law, indiscriminate bombing of densely populated areas may amount to war crimes,” the agency’s spokesperson says.
Feb 7: The Gaza health ministry says at least 100 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes over the last 24 hours. The military also continues its siege of the Al-Amal Hospital, where the Palestine Red Crescent says two people are injured from Israeli firing. Soldiers fired at the medics while “they were transferring several wounded individuals from Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in preparation for their transfer to hospitals in the south”.
In a report, the UN humanitarian office says Israel declined access to 56pc of planned aid missions to north Gaza, which has been completely reduced to rubble. The UN agency says that out of the 61 planned missions to the north, only 10 were facilitated by the Israeli authorities; two were partially facilitated; 34 were denied access; and six were postponed by aid organisations due to “internal operational constraints”.
It adds that the facilitated mission primarily involved food distribution and requested access to support critical hospitals.
Feb 8: The UN agency for Palestinian refugees says 300,000 people in the north of Gaza are at risk of famine as Israel has blocked more than half of aid missions there since the beginning of 2024. According to the health ministry, Israeli attacks have killed 130 people and wounded over 170 in the last 24 hours.
In Rafah, where PM Netanyahu has told the military to advance, 14 Palestinians are killed in attacks throughout the day. The southern Gaza city is sheltering more than 1.2m people who fled other parts of the enclave after Israeli evacuation orders.
Feb 9: Despite warnings from the UN and US, the Israeli military is ramping up attacks on Rafah. It is launching several rounds of air strikes and tank shelling on the city. Palestinian news agency Wafa reports at least eight people, including three children, were killed in Israeli attacks on a home in Rafah. Five of the deceased are from the same family.
In Khan Younis, Israeli snipers kill at least 21 people outside Nasser Hospital, with medical staff among those targeted, Al Jazeera reports. Even at the Al-Amal Hospital, staff members and patients are arrested by Israeli forces.
The UN says nearly one in 10 children in Gaza below the age of five are suffering from acute malnutrition as aid groups say Israeli forces are consistently blocking aid from the strip. It adds that some people in the enclave are so desperate for food that they are eating grass.
Feb 10: Six-year-old Hind Rajab, who came under Israeli fire along with her family in Gaza City, is found dead after 12 days along with two medics sent to find her. But the Israeli military, which faced calls by rights groups and the US to investigate the incident, later on, said that it did not have soldiers around the area where the girl, her family members and two medics sent to rescue her were killed.
The death toll in the strip has now crossed 28,000, with 117 casualties reported in just the last 24 hours.
Feb 11: In a report, Al Jazeera says Israel has been killing at least 100 people in airstrikes on Rafah every day, where Tel Aviv is planning to take the war. According to the Gaza health ministry, 112 Palestinians have become victims of bombings in the last 24 hours. On the other hand, Palestinians returning to the north from Rafah are being targeted by both airstrikes and Israeli snipers, TRT World reports.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, on which hundreds of thousands of Gazans are dependent, is facing increased hurdles in bringing in aid to the enclave due to a “hostile environment” created by Israel.
Feb 12: At least 67 Palestinians are killed in predawn Israeli air and sea attacks on Rafah, according to the health ministry. Fourteen houses and three mosques are hit in these airstrikes, officials say. The situation at hospitals in the south is now terrible, doctors say. The medical facilities are working way beyond their capacities amid a shortage of medical staff and supplies.
Humanitarian conditions in Gaza have continued to deteriorate, with the UN warning of hunger and “unprecedented levels of acute food insecurity” as Israel continues to restrict aid deliveries.
Feb 13: Israeli tanks shell parts of Rafah once again, sparking a wave of panic among Palestinians sheltering there. At least 133 Palestinians have been killed in the last 24 hours, the health ministry says. Among the wounded are also two Al Jazeera journalists who came under an Israeli drone attack, in what the outlet calls “deliberate targeting”.
In Khan Younis, Israeli forces are using speakers attached to drones and ordering the evacuation of the Nasser Hospital where hundreds of patients are under treatment. According to the Palestinian health ministry, three people in the vicinity of the facility are killed by Israeli snipers while 10 others are injured.
With widespread hunger and famine across the enclave, the World Food Programme says its efforts to reach those in need have come under constant strain as Israeli forces are consistently blocking aid envoys from large portions of Gaza. “There is nowhere safe,” the agency says in a social media post.
Feb 14: More than 1,500 patients, medical workers and displaced Palestinians remain trapped at Khan Younis’ besieged Nasser Hospital, which Israeli forces have ordered to evacuate, the health ministry in Gaza says. People trying to leave the facility are coming under fire by Israeli snipers. Meanwhile, the WHO says it has been blocked from the hospital since January 29.
Intense shelling is also taking place at the Al-Amal Hospital, according to the Palestine Red Crescent.
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan says the Israeli government has not allowed aid, particularly flour, into Gaza despite promises. In the coastal enclave, a never-before-seen food crisis is being witnessed where aid agencies say families are going without eating for days.
Feb 15: Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, who earlier came to Rafah, are now leaving the city ahead of a feared Israeli assault — spurring yet another cycle of displacement. They are now heading to Deir al-Balah and Nuseirat refugee camps in central Gaza. According to the UNRWA, 17,000 Palestinian children have been separated from their parents in Gaza as a result of this movement and the war.
In Khan Younis, the Israeli military raids the Nasser Hospital, one of Gaza’s last functioning medical facilities, after a days-long siege. The forces fire on the facility and expel patients and medical workers, in what is called a “war crime” by the strip’s media office.
In the north, where Palestinians are now going back, aid distribution is “non-existent”, a Unicef official says. “What we’re hearing from families on the ground in the north is that hunger is catastrophic and people are resorting to non-human foods to try and survive,” he states.
Feb 16: At least five patients at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis die after electricity is severed and oxygen supplies cut following an Israeli incursion into the facility a day earlier. The Israeli military, on the other hand, is calling the raid “precise and limited”, adding that it detained dozens of “terrorists”, without providing any evidence.
The health ministry in Gaza alleges that the Israeli army is preventing a WHO convoy carrying essential medical supplies from reaching the Nasser Hospital. It is important to note that blocking aid, storming hospitals and laying siege there is a pattern that has been observed in Gaza since the beginning of the war, a pattern that includes deliberately inflicting conditions on Palestinians to bring about their physical destruction in whole or in part — basically, genocide.
Feb 17: Dozens of Palestinians are killed in an “extraordinarily bloody day” of Israeli bombardment across the Gaza Strip — north, central and south. An Israeli raid is reported in Rafah, while 44 Palestinians are killed in the central areas of the strip with many more trapped under the rubble.
Meanwhile, the health ministry says Israeli soldiers have arrested a “large number” of workers at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, while they were “performing their professional humanitarian duty in treating the wounded and sick”.
Feb 18: The health ministry in Gaza says Nasser Hospital, the second-largest medical facility in the enclave, has been put “completely out of service” after Israel raids it. “There are only four medical staffers currently caring for patients” inside the Nasser Hospital, it adds.
As the enclave continues to lose its hospitals, at least 127 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours.
On the other hand, Al Jazeera reports Palestinians in north Gaza have come under fire waiting for humanitarian trucks. Fire from Israeli snipers forces them to run and take cover. People are desperate in this part of the enclave, where the absence of aid has forced them to find alternatives to food including animal feed.
Feb 19: The death toll in Gaza has now crossed 29,000 with no let up in Israeli attacks across the strip. At least 107 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza in the past 24 hours, the health ministry says.
In a report, Unicef warns of an “explosion in preventable child deaths” in the territory. It finds that 16pc children below the age of two in northern Gaza, where Israel has been stopping aid, are acutely malnourished.
Separately, human rights experts have called for an independent probe into alleged Israeli abuses against Palestinian women and girls in Gaza and West Bank, such as killings, rapes and sexual assault. They cite reports of women and girls reportedly being “arbitrarily executed in Gaza, often together with family members, including their children”.
Feb 20: The World Food Programme announces suspending aid deliveries to northern Gaza, citing a “breakdown of social order” in an area that is starving due to Israeli blockades. Even when aid reaches the north, Israel has on two occasions opened fire on hungry Palestinians queuing up for food. The Gaza media office says the move “would mean a death sentence for three-quarters of a million people” and will “exponentially worsen the humanitarian situation”.
On the other hand, the health ministry in the enclave says 103 people have been killed in Israeli strikes over the last 24 hours. Al Jazeera reports that a majority of the wounded people remain trapped under the rubble as civil defence crews have been prevented from reaching the attack sites due to the intensity of Israeli bombardment.
Feb 21: Eight patients have died at the besieged Nasser Hospital, located in Khan Younis after Israel raided the medical complex, the Gaza health ministry says. There is a dire shortage of food and medicines at the facility, while generators have been shut down due to a lack of fuel. A UN official says the hospital has now become a “place of death” with bodies piled up on the floor and patients in desperate conditions.
On the other hand, Doctors Without Borders has released a statement condemning an Israeli attack on a “clearly marked” shelter in Gaza’s Al-Mawasi area, Al Jazeera reports. The group says that an Israeli tank shelled the building, killing two family members of workers who were sheltering there, despite coordination on their location with Israeli authorities. The group’s director calls the amount of force being used in densely populated urban areas “staggering”.
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs says Israel is pushing more than 2 million people in Gaza to the brink of death, particularly the 200,000 Palestinians living in the north. “Israel’s prevention of aid trucks from entering and its occasional targeting of the few allowed in is already resulting in the death of children, elderly and patients,” it says. The ministry adds that the sight of thousands of children holding empty pots and standing in long queues waiting for food dominates life in the northern part of the enclave.
Feb 22: At least 40 Palestinians have been killed in a series of Israeli strikes across central Gaza, the health ministry says. Rescue workers are searching through the rubble of collapsed buildings for bodies that remain trapped underneath. Heavy Israeli strikes flatten homes and mosques in Rafah.
In north Gaza, dozens of Palestinian children rally to protest the scarcity of food and water as Israel continues to block aid. The children, frail and sunken, hold banners with “bread becomes my dream” and “we want food” inscribed on them. These are conditions created by Israel by not letting aid into the enclave.
Feb 23: At least 24 Palestinians are killed in an Israeli strike on a home sheltering dozens of displaced people, mostly women and children. The health ministry says the figure is expected to rise, adding that over 100 Gazans have been killed in Israeli attacks over the last 24 hours.
At the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, 13 bodies have been buried on the facility’s ground after the complex ran out of oxygen. The hospital was besieged for days followed by an Israeli raid.
The health ministry further says that at least 350,000 chronic patients, 60,000 pregnant women and about 700,000 children in Gaza are exposed to serious health complications as a result of malnutrition, dehydration and lack of medical facilities.
Feb 24: Israeli air strikes target homes in southern Gaza, with the health ministry saying more than 100 people were killed in the 24-hour period. Israeli bombardments destroy one house and leave a gaping hole in the earth east of Rafah, where about 1.4 million Gazans have converged in a futile attempt to escape the relentless attacks. Separate attacks at the Shati refugee camp and Deir al-Balah kill dozens, including a four-month-old boy.
Al-Haq, the Palestinian legal rights organisation, says human rights lawyer Dana Yaghy is killed in an Israeli strike on Dier al-Balah along with 40 members of her family. The 27-year-old was killed a few days after her colleague Nour Abu Al-Nour, “both fantastic young lawyers”, the organisation adds.
Feb 25: A two-month-old Palestinian boy dies from starvation at the Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza, Al Jazeera reports. “The baby has not been fed any milk for days, as baby milk is totally absent in Gaza,” a medic at the facility says. Aid agencies say stringent checks by Israeli forces have hampered the entry of food trucks into the enclave. Even when supplies do get through to Gaza, aid workers say they are not able to pick up the goods or distribute them because of a lack of security, caused in part by Israel’s targeted killings of policemen guarding the envoys.
According to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, it hasn’t been able to deliver food to northern Gaza since Jan 23, where the group says a “man-made famine” has occurred. The Gaza health ministry warns of a catastrophic situation “beyond description” as hospitals are out of fuel, putting the lives of critical patients at risk.
On the other hand, the Gaza media office claims Israeli forces have been committing “crimes against humanity” in the enclave, which together fit the legal definition of genocide. Here are some of them:
- Deliberate killings
- Torture
- Forced displacement
- Hostage-taking
- Using hunger as a weapon of war
- Bombing homes, places of worship and schools
- Targeting heritage sites and medical centres
Feb 26: As the death toll in Gaza continues to rise, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International say in separate statements that Israel is failing to follow the International Court of Justice’s ruling to take “immediate and effective measures” to protect Palestinians and allow adequate aid into the enclave.
Gaza’s Media Office says Israel has killed 3,535 Palestinians in the enclave, destroyed 17 civil government instructions, damaged 11 hospitals and universities and put one hospital out of service in the 30 days since the top UN court’s order.
Feb 27: The UN humanitarian affairs chief says that about a quarter of Gaza’s population — estimated to be some 576,000 people — is “one step away from famine” as Israel continues to block large portions of humanitarian aid amid deteriorating conditions in the strip.
Doctors Without Borders also adds that it sees “no signs” that Israel is attempting to alleviate suffering or avoid civilian casualties in Gaza, adding that the Israeli forces have instead “tightened” restrictions on humanitarian assistance in the strip.
On the other hand, Reuters reports that Israel stalled a medical evacuation convoy in Khan Younis, detaining a paramedic and forcing others to remove their clothes. The Israeli military did not immediately comment, saying it was checking the details of the incident.
Feb 28: The health ministry in Gaza says six children at the Kamal Adwan and Al-Shifa Hospital in the north — where aid hasn’t reached in days — have died from dehydration and malnutrition. Al Jazeera footage shows a Palestinian man bleeding on the floor next to a bag of flour, reportedly shot by Israeli troops while he waited for aid.
Along with food, a water crisis is also unfolding in the strip with the UNRWA saying that a quarter of Gaza’s wells have been bombed since Oct 7. “Famine is looming. Hospitals have turned into battlefields. 1 million children face daily trauma,” the agency adds.
Feb 29: The death toll in Gaza surpasses 30,000 after at least 100 Palestinians are killed by Israeli forces while collecting food aid in Gaza City. The attack, described as a cold-blooded massacre by the health ministry, took place when hundreds of people congregated at al-Rashid Street where aid trucks carrying flour were believed to be on the way.
Footage verified by Al Jazeera shows dozens of killed and wounded Palestinians being carried onto trucks as no ambulances are able to reach the area due to roads being completely destroyed. These are all starved people who are desperate for food. Reporters present at the scene say Israeli tanks advanced and ran over many bodies.
On the same day, it is also reported that Israeli air raids and shelling killed at least 30 people in separate attacks on Nuseirat, Bureij and Khan Younis refugee camps. Meanwhile, hospitals across the besieged enclave are unable to treat the overwhelming number of injured people coming in amid a shortage of medical equipment and staff.
Israel says its forces fired at the crowd after aid trucks were stormed. However, humanitarian groups say Israeli restrictions on food assistance to the north of Gaza have created unbearable conditions that prompted the incident.
March 1: Israeli strikes kill and injure dozens of Palestinians from the north to the south of the enclave, Al Jazeera reports. Casualties are reported in Rafah, Khan Younis, Deir al-Balah and Beit Hanoon.
Meanwhile, Palestinian health officials and the UN visit Al-Shifa Hospital. They say many of those brought in after the Gaza City food distribution attack have gunshot wounds, challenging Israel’s narrative that the stampede caused most casualties.
In a separate statement, the WHO laments the system in Gaza “is on its knees”, with the agency’s spokesperson saying all the lifelines in Gaza have more or less been cut. “The food supplies have been cut off deliberately. Let’s not forget that,” he adds.
March 2: At least 11 Palestinians are killed and 50 wounded after an Israeli air attack on a tent housing displaced people near a hospital in Rafah, the health ministry says. Three houses are also attacked in Deri al-Balah and Jabalia, taking the lives of more than 17 people.
March 3: At least 90 Palestinians are killed in “nine massacres” over the past 24 hours, the health ministry in Gaza says. The number of children in the enclave who have died from starvation now stands at 15, with a UN official saying Israel is intentionally starving the people of the strip.
The ministry further says that Israeli forces “committed a horrific massacre” in Gaza City against people waiting for aid distribution, yet again. Dozens of people were killed and wounded, it adds. An aid truck is also targeted in Deir al-Balah, leaving eight Palestinians killed and many more wounded. Meanwhile, an official at Amnesty International says Israel’s claims regarding the flour massacre on Feb 29 contradict “concrete evidence”.
Separately, the Palestine Prisoner’s Society says the total number of Palestinians detained by Israel in the West Bank since Oct 7 has reached 7,340. It adds that Palestinian towns, cities and villages have been subjected to overnight raids, beatings, threats and destruction of homes.
March 4: Israel once again attacks aid seekers gathered in Gaza City, Al Jazeera reports. The health ministry says it has detected about a million cases of infectious diseases across the enclave, describing the medical situation as “extremely catastrophic”. In a statement, it stresses that the Israeli forces “deliberately” caused an unspeakable humanitarian and health catastrophe, which contributed to the spread of these diseases.
Separately, the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor says it “documented the Israeli army’s killing of a Palestinian man who was deliberately run over in Gaza City’s Al-Zaytoun neighbourhood on Feb 29 after he was arrested”.
“The man was subjected to harsh interrogation by members of the Israeli army, who bound his hands with plastic zip-tie handcuffs before running him over with a military vehicle from the bottom to the top of his body,” it adds.
March 5: The UN’s Palestinian refugee agency says Gazans detained by Israeli forces are coming back “completely traumatised” and reporting abuses while in captivity.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that an Israeli air attack on a home in Khan Younis has killed eight people. The deceased also include a journalist, which brings the total number of media workers killed in the enclave since Oct 7 to 133, the Gaza media office says. The UN agency for Palestinian refugees says 17,000 children in Gaza have been orphaned, leaving them under immense mental trauma.
March 6: Gaza officials report 20 Palestinians, mostly children, have died from malnutrition and starvation as the World Food Programme says an aid convoy headed to the north of the strip has been denied entry by the Israeli military. It stressed that there must be road access to Gaza’s north “to avert famine”.
These conditions have forced Palestinian children in the enclave to protest. Young girls and boys hold banners inscribed with “stop our daily daith” in Rafah while others carry burial shrouds on stretchers to symbolise those who have died of hunger.
On the other hand, new mothers across the enclave are being forced to deliver in absolutely desperate conditions. They face the stark challenge of keeping infants alive in a Gaza that is bereft of basic necessities such as food and water amid continuous Israeli bombardment.
March 7: The health ministry in Gaza says Israel has killed about 9,000 women, including thousands of mothers, pregnant women and health personnel. Around 60,000 pregnant women in the strip suffer from dehydration, malnutrition and lack of proper healthcare. About 5,000 pregnant women in the strip are giving birth every month in harsh, unsafe and unhealthy conditions due to Israeli bombardment and displacement.
Israel’s aforementioned actions fall under the UN Genocide Convention, which talks about imposing measures intended to prevent births within a group.
March 8: Palestinians in Gaza witness another one of their bloodiest nights after Israeli air strikes target residential buildings cramped with displaced people in Deir al-Balah repeatedly. Separately, five Palestinians are killed by airdropped aid boxes after parachutes fail to open. US and other countries are airdropping aid into the enclave which is in need of immediate humanitarian relief amid tight Israeli restrictions.
On the other hand, a CNN analysis of Gaza’s satellite imagery shows Israel is building a road splitting the enclave in two, which has now reached the Mediterranean coast. Quoting Israeli officials, the report says it is part of a security plan to control the territory for months and possibly years to come. Israeli Minister for Diaspora Affairs Amichai Chikli tells CNN that the new road will “make it easier” for the Israeli military to launch raids north of Gaza City and south, to the central area of the Gaza Strip. The action amounts to deliberately inflicting on Palestinians conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction, as per the genocide convention.
March 9: The number of deaths from starvation in Gaza increase to 25, the health ministry says. In Rafah, Israeli forces strike one of the largest residential towers of the city, the 12-floor Burj al-Masri building, forcing hundreds of already displaced Palestinians to flee. One of the tower’s 300 residents tells Reuters that Israel gave them a 30-minute warning to flee the building at night.
In the north, where Palestinians are starving, the Israeli army destroys three of four wells in Jabalia.
March 10: Israel is intensifying its attacks across the strip, killing at least 15 people, including women and children, in southern Gaza. The death toll since Oct 7 has surged to 31,000. Gaza’s municipal office says Israel has bombed one million square meters of roads in Gaza City, which is preventing food aid from reaching Palestinians in the north.
On the other hand, Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor says its team on the ground in Gaza “is recording nearly daily deaths among the elderly due to Israel’s systematic and pervasive crimes of starvation and treatment deprivation” in the strip, particularly in the north. “The majority of these cases do not reach hospitals, which are only partially operational in northern Gaza because of the difficulty of access given the ongoing Israeli military attacks. Consequently, after dying at home, the elderly are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries,” it adds.
March 11: As the holy month of Ramadan begins, the UN agency for Palestinians says “hunger is everywhere in Gaza”. Two more children die of starvation. Israel says aid is being airdropped over the north of the enclave but more than 2,000 medical staff are still going hungry, Al Jazeera reports.
The UN agency for Palestinians says a convoy of aid trucks is turned back by Israel because medical scissors were on board. “An entire population depends on humanitarian assistance for survival” as conditions grow worse in the Gaza Strip, the agency’s head says.
In the West Bank, Israel has issued restrictions on Palestinians at the entrance to the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
March 12: Chaotic scenes emerge from central and south Gaza where Palestinians are forced to flee from residential buildings and camps due to the unsparing Israeli attacks. Reporters say Israel is repeatedly attacking aid seekers across the enclave, in what is becoming a new norm. According to Palestinian health officials, at least nine Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded by Israeli gunfire as crowds awaited aid trucks on Kuwait Square in northern Gaza City. The total number of people killed in such attacks since Oct 7 is 400.
On the other hand, the UN agency for Palestinian Refugees says more children have been killed in the four months of the war in Gaza than in four years of global conflicts.
March 13: Gaza health ministry says 27 Palestinians have died of starvation while over 70 were killed during overnight Israeli strikes targeting houses in southern Gaza. An Israeli attack targets a UN aid distribution centre in Rafah, killing at least one UNRWA staff member and wounding over 20 others. “How are we to maintain aid operations when our teams and supplies are constantly under threat?” asks the UN relief chief in response to the attack.
March 14: At least 21 people are killed and over 150 injured after Israeli forces once again open fire on Palestinians waiting for aid in north Gaza, the health ministry says. Separately, in another round of intense bombardments, nine members of a family are killed in an attack on a house in Deir al-Balah.
On the other hand, the UN agency for Palestinians says out of the dozen hospitals in the strip, only two can provide maternity services. There are about 180 women giving birth in the enclave daily. The lack of services is putting their’s and their children’s lives at immense risk.
March 15: The Israeli military has carried out five separate attacks on aid distribution centres across Gaza in the past 48 hours, killing 56 people and injuring over 300, the health ministry says.
Unicef, the UN agency for children, reports a “staggering escalation” in infant deaths in Gaza. It says 31pc, or one in three kids, under the age of two in northern Gaza, are now suffering from acute malnutrition due to the ongoing Israeli restrictions on aid delivery. Doctors further say that there is a “huge increase” in pre-term births and a rising number of miscarriages and stillbirths.
March 16: At least 36 people of the same family, mostly women and children, are killed in Israeli strikes on the Nuseirat refugee camp. According to eyewitnesses, the Tabatibi family had gathered in central Gaza to eat together during the first Friday night of Ramazan when they were attacked.
March 17: An Israeli air attack on a home in Deir el-Balah kills 12 Palestinians, mostly women and children. According to the health ministry, at least 61 people are killed in overnight Israeli bombing.
The executive director of Unicef says aid being airdropped into Gaza is a “drop into the ocean”, adding that the land route is so far the best for bringing in necessary supplies into the enclave. However, there is a great “bureaucratic challenge” in that. She adds that the babies in the enclave are starving due to Israel’s blockades. “Essentially, the body starts to consume itself as it has nothing else and it’s a painful, painful death for children,” the official says, adding that babies don’t even have the energy to cry.
March 18: Israeli military has once again stormed the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City with tanks and heavy gunfire, resulting in deaths and injuries, Palestinian officials say. Israel says it is conducting a “precise operation” at the medical facility where about 30,000 Palestinians, including displaced civilians, medical staff and wounded staff are trapped.
In a message on Telegram, the health ministry in Gaza says anyone “who tries to move is targeted by sniper bullets and quadcopter”. Palestinians living in the neighbourhood report heavy gunfire and artillery shelling have resulted in several casualties but cannot be transported to the hospital. A fire also breaks out at the surgical building on Al-Shifa due to Israeli shelling.
March 19: The Israeli military says it killed 90 “gunmen” and detained 300 in its raid on the Al-Shifa Hospital. The health authorities in the enclave reject the claims, saying all of the killed people were displaced Palestinians staying at the hospital. Meanwhile, over 15 Palestinians are killed in Israeli bombing of a house in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.
In the north, at least 23 Gazans are killed after Israeli air strikes target aid distribution workers. The UN says Israel allowed 11 of 24 planned aid missions into northern Gaza this month. The rest were either denied or postponed.
March 20: Gaza media office says more than 100 aid workers have been killed and dozens injured over the past week in eight Israeli attacks. On the other hand, footage of a four-year-old girl, whose face was severely burned by an Israeli attack on her house in Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, is doing the rounds on social media. It has sparked anger among social media users and triggered calls for help.
Speaking to Al Jazeera about their detention at the Al-Shifa hospital, displaced Palestinians say they were interrogated for hours and told to take off their clothes. They were then told to move south. Meanwhile, Gaza civil defence says Israel has refused to coordinate with international groups to allow rescue workers to access “hundreds” of wounded Palestinians at the medical complex.
March 21: Thirteen patients have died at the Al-Shifa Hospital — which was raided by Israeli authorities a few days back — after they were deprived of medicines, oxygen and food, the Gaza media office says. The death toll in the enclave since Oct 7 now stands at 32,000 with over 70 casualties reported over the last 24 hours. Authorities in Gaza say an Israeli drone bombed young civilians in Khan Younis, turning them into scattered pieces, calling it a “war crime”.
On the other hand, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees says women in Gaza are having premature deliveries. “Mothers are concerned they won’t be alive in two weeks. They are concerned that the hospital won’t be here in two weeks and they are trying to have babies early to give up their lives to preserve their babies,” it says.
March 22: Israel’s military siege of Al-Shifa Hospital continues for the fifth day with more than 160 people killed and 600 arrested, including medical staff. Hundreds of patients at the medical facility are at risk as operations cease. The WHO describes the conditions inside the hospital as “utterly inhumane”.
Other hospitals in Gaza too are at breaking point due to a lack of critically needed medical supplies blocked by Israel and the overwhelming number of wounded persons coming in.
Separately, Palestinian Agricultural Work Committees Union reports Israel’s use of banned munitions — such as white phosphorus, harmful bombs and missiles — is rendering Gaza’s soil poisonous. It notes that these weapons could cause blindness, cancer, as well as amputation of hands and feet, and skin burns in the future.
March 23: Overnight Israeli attacks kill over 70 and injure hundreds of Palestinians across the Gaza Strip. Among the deceased are five children who were killed in an airstrike on Rafah. Israel also kills 19 aid seekers gathered in north Gaza, where the UN says all its aid requests have been declined in the last week.
Heavy fighting continues around the Al-Shifa Hospital even as patients are dying inside the besieged complex, parts of which have been blown up by the Israeli military. The health ministry says five more patients at the hospital have died as food and water runs out. The Euro-Med Monitor further reports that Israeli forces set fire to homes surrounding the Al-Shifa Medical Complex while occupants were still inside.
March 24: As Israel continues its deadly operations in the vicinity of Al-Shifa, forces besiege medical facilities in the south of the enclave — Al-Amal and Nasser hospitals. Heavy bombardment and gunfire are reported near the facilities followed by evacuation orders. In the last 24 hours, 84 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza, the health ministry says.
On the other hand, Israel has barred convoys of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees into northern Gaza — a decision that the UN says will result in the deaths of more Palestinians.
March 25: Israeli air strikes kill at least 22 Palestinians in Gaza’s Deir al-Balah and another 30 in Rafah, the health ministry says. Amid these attacks, Israel’s Al-Amal Hospital, besieged by Israeli forces in recent days, goes out of service after “the occupation forced the hospital staff and the wounded to evacuate it and closed its entrances with earthen barriers”, the Palestine Red Crescent says.
UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesa Albanese, writes to the UN Security Council saying that “Israel’s genocide on the Palestinians in Gaza is an escalatory stage of a long-standing settler-colonial process of erasure”. The report finds that “there are reasonable grounds to believe” that the threshold for several genocidal acts against Palestinians, mentioned at the beginning of the piece, is met.
March 26: An Israeli raid kills 15 Palestinians, including children, in Rafah, the Gaza health ministry says, adding that over 81 people have been killed across the strip in the last 24 hours. Palestinians say Israeli forces have stepped up attacks in Rafah, where millions of displaced people are crammed, despite warnings from the international community.
In Khan Younis, Israeli tanks encircle Nasser Hospital, Gaza’s second-largest medical facility. In recent days, shots have been fired at the complex but a raid has not taken place yet. Gaza’s Health Ministry says Israeli troops are now shooting and firing “shells and [conducting] violent raids in its surroundings in preparation for its storming”.
March 27: Several people are killed and injured in an Israeli strike targeting an aid distribution committee in the south of Gaza, Al Jazeera reports. Intense bombardment is reported in Rafah, with at least 66 Palestinians killed overnight.
Meanwhile, local authorities say at least 12 people drowned off the northern Gaza coast near Beit Lahia while trying to reach airdropped parcels that landed in the sea, CNN reports. Footage obtained by CNN shows hundreds of Palestinians rushing to the site of the aid drop, with some venturing into the water as parcels crashed down on the shores. Human rights groups have repeatedly criticised airdrops as an inefficient and degrading way of getting aid to Gazans, instead urging Israeli authorities to lift controls on land crossings into the enclave.
March 28: A five-year-old boy becomes the latest child to die of malnutrition in besieged and bombarded Gaza as the UN agency warns “time is running out” to prevent a famine in the enclave where Israel has imposed aid restrictions. In southern Rafah, a strike on a residential building kills at least 12 Palestinians, including women and children.
Meanwhile, Al Jazeera footage shows Israeli forces shooting dead two Palestinian men, one of them holding a white flag. According to the news outlet, they were trying to return to their homes in the north of the strip when they were encountered by Israeli soldiers at al-Rashid Street.
A UN-backed report reveals that Israeli forces are responsible for more than 200 “direct hits” on schools across Gaza. It shows that at least 53 schools in Gaza have been completely destroyed since Oct 7, adding that there was a drastic increase in these attacks after mid-February. According to the UN, schools and hospitals are meant to be safe havens even during conflicts.
March 29: At least 71 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli bombardment across the Gaza strip in the last 24 hours, the health ministry says. In Gaza City, at least 15 people are killed in an Israeli strike on a sports centre, while many are reportedly injured in the bombing of a mosque in the Jabalia refugee camp.
Israel continues to deny UN aid missions to northern Gaza where a famine is fast spreading. According to a report by the agency’s humanitarian office, Israel denied eight of 19 missions between March 23 and 29.
March 30: Dozens of patients and medical staff remain trapped at the besieged Al-Shifa Hospital, which has been raided by Israel for the second time since Oct 7. The medical facility faces a severe shortage of food, water and critical supplies. However, the WHO has been denied access to the facility. The Gaza health ministry says Israel has killed over 400 people and burned or destroyed 1,050 homes in the vicinity of Al-Shifa after laying siege to it for 13 days.
In yet another “massacre”, Israel kills at least 12 Palestinian aid seekers who gathered in north Gaza to collect food, Wafa news agency reports. Visuals show wounded people lying on the ground as civilians struggle to take the wounded to the hospitals.
March 31: Gaza’s media office says Israel has committed a “new massacre” by bombing the tents of journalists and displaced people inside the walls of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital. At least four people are killed. The attack is also witnessed by the WHO.
Israel again opens fire on aid seekers in north Gaza. Witnesses tell AFP that shots were fired by those overseeing the aid delivery and Israeli troops after which panicked lorry drivers quickly drove away, hitting people trying to get food. Israel says it has “no record” of the incident.
The Kuwaiti roundabout, where the aid distribution takes place, has in recent days become a death trap for Palestinians. But they keep going there because they have no other option, says an Al Jazeera journalist. “They know they might be targeted, but they don’t want to return to their houses and families empty-handed,” he adds.
Header image: Relatives, colleagues and loved ones of Palestinian journalists Sari Mansour and Hasona Saliem, who were killed while working, mourn during funeral ceremony in Deir al-Balah. — Anadolu Agency