Israeli forces launched airstrikes across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, destroying homes in towns east of Khan Younis and killing at least 55 people over a 24-hour period. The military operations occurred as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was due to address the U.S. Congress and meet with American leadership amid ongoing ceasefire talks.
Intense Airstrikes and Evacuations Across Gaza
Israeli military operations intensified across multiple sectors of the Gaza Strip, forcing thousands of residents to flee westward from towns east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza. The Palestinian Civil Emergency Service reported receiving numerous distress calls from residents trapped inside their homes in Bani Suhaila, though emergency crews remained unable to reach the town due to ongoing combat.
Medics confirmed that two Palestinians died in an airstrike in Bani Suhaila. The armed wing of Hamas stated that its fighters detonated a bomb targeting an Israeli army personnel carrier in the area. Meanwhile, the Israeli military reported operating in sectors from which militants had fired rockets into Israel and attack Israeli troops.
Additional airstrikes struck central and northern Gaza, including an attack on the Al-Bureij camp that local health officials said killed nine people. In Rafah, troops engaged in close-quarter combat and discovered a tunnel shaft, weapons, and night vision equipment inside a children’s bedroom within a civilian building. Gaza health officials stated that military strikes over the preceding 24 hours brought the death toll in the enclave past 39,000 Palestinians since the war began following the October 7 attack on Israel.
The Israeli military said it has so far lost 326 troops in Gaza. One soldier was seriously hurt during combat on Wednesday, according to the military. The Palestinian Health Ministry does not distinguish between combatant and non-combatants in its fatality reports, but local health officials say most of the Palestinians killed have been civilians. Israel says at least a third are fighters. Hamas-led fighters triggered the war on Oct. 7 by storming into southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 250 captives, according to Israeli tallies. Some 120 hostages are still being held though Israel believes one in three are dead.
Displaced Residents Express Despair Amid Evacuation Orders
The Israeli military issued evacuation orders via social media and telephone calls, instructing residents to move west toward a designated humanitarian area. Displaced civilians, however, reported that the designated zone remained unsafe. Many families who have been displaced multiple times expressed profound exhaustion with the ongoing conflict.
“Where should we go? Shall we cross into the sea?”
Ghada, displaced resident
Ghada, displaced six times during the war, voiced the collective fatigue of families sheltering in Hamad City in northwestern Khan Younis. We are exhausted, starved, and want the war to end now, now not an hour later,
she added via a chat app.
Diplomatic Friction and Washington Visit
The military escalation coincided with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the United States. Netanyahu was due to address the U.S. Congress, meet with President Joe Biden at the White House on Thursday, and hold discussions with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in Florida on Friday.
“The United States is a main partner in what is happening in Gaza. We are being killed because of the United States. We are being slaughtered by American planes, American ships, American tanks, and American troops,”
Kazem Abu Taha, displaced resident from Rafah
Simultaneously, families of hostages held in Gaza demanded more decisive action from the government. At this crucial moment, the Prime Minister’s trip to Washington, D.C. holds no significance unless it includes the words: ‘There’s a deal,’
The Hostages Families Forum said.
Ceasefire Prospects and Ongoing Truce Negotiations
While Netanyahu maintained that a deal to release Israelis from captivity in Gaza could be nearing, Hamas officials asserted they observed no change in Israel’s stance. An Israeli official confirmed that an Israeli delegation would take part in ceasefire talks, mediated by Washington, Cairo, and Egypt, next week. Hamas wants a ceasefire agreement to end the war in Gaza, whereas Netanyahu says the war cannot end before Hamas is eradicated.
The broader diplomatic and security landscape also involved separate incidents along the border, including earlier Israeli jets striking a Hamas military target in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for balloon-borne explosive devices late on Tuesday, the fourth such strike in recent days. A Palestinian security source confirmed the strikes, with no injuries reported. The army said in a statement that fighter jets and aircraft struck a number of terror targets in a Hamas military compound in the northern Gaza Strip
in response to explosive balloons launched from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory. A Palestinian security source in Gaza said a number of Hamas sites, including an observation post, were hit near Gaza City, causing damage but no injuries, while witnesses also described an explosion at a Hamas site in southern Gaza.
Historically, incendiary balloons have involved flaming devices floated across the border with the aim of starting fires in Israeli communities and farmlands on the other side, often during events like the nearly year-long Great March of Return protests. The use of flying incendiary devices largely stopped after an informal Egyptian-brokered truce agreement between Hamas and Israel in November, under which Israel agreed to ease its crippling blockade of Gaza in exchange for calm. Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip, has accused Israel of breaching the terms of that agreement. An Egyptian security delegation also met for talks with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza on Tuesday, continuing efforts to navigate a complex backdrop of long-standing blockades, border protests, and high civilian casualties that continue to define the enclave’s humanitarian crisis.
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