4 Israeli soldiers killed, 3 injured in Gaza bomb attack

Gaza City: At least 4 Israeli soldiers were killed and three others were injured in a roadside bomb attack in Rafah area of Gaza, the Israeli military said on Thursday.

The Israeli military said it continued to target Hamas and was also operating in the southern areas of Rafah and Khan Yunis.

Ready to send your soldiers to hell, Hamas warns

Hamas’s armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, warned the military to expect fierce fighting.

“We are ready to send the lives of your soldiers to hell, and we have prepared for you an army of martyrs,” the group said in a statement.

“Gaza will be a cemetery for your soldiers.”

Later on Thursday the Israeli military said four of its soldiers had been killed using an explosive device in Rafah, in southern Gaza.

Israeli tanks and jets pounded Gaza City, the target of a major ground offensive, on Thursday prompting Palestinians to flee south.

Read More: US vetoes UN demand for ceasefire, aid access in Gaza

AFP journalists and witnesses saw a steady stream of Gazans heading south on foot, in vehicles and on donkey carts — their meagre belongings piled high.

“There is artillery fire, air strikes, quadcopter and drone gunfire. The bombing never stops,” said Aya Ahmed, 32, sheltering with 13 relatives in Gaza City.

“The world doesn’t understand what is happening. They (Israel) want us to evacuate south — but where will we live? There are no tents, no transport, no money.”

Palestinians say the cost of a ride to the south has soared, in some cases topping $1,000.

“The situation is indescribable — crowds everywhere, the sound of explosions, women and men crying and screaming as they walked while carrying their belongings,” said Shadi Jawad, 47, describing his family’s ordeal as they fled their home on Wednesday.

“God, send a missile to take us out and relieve us,” he said.

The offensive has sparked international outrage, with the territory already devastated by nearly two years of war and the Gaza City area gripped by a UN-declared famine.

It comes ahead of a planned move by several Western countries, including France and Britain, to recognise a Palestinian state later this month at the UN.

US President Donald Trump, currently on a visit to Britain, said Thursday he had a “disagreement” with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer over this.

The United States on Thursday again vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, shielding its ally Israel from diplomatic pressure.

– ‘Unfit for human dignity’ –

“The military incursion and evacuation orders in northern Gaza are driving new waves of displacement, forcing traumatised families into an ever-shrinking area unfit for human dignity,” World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X.

“Hospitals, already overwhelmed, are on the brink of collapse as escalating violence blocks access and prevents WHO from delivering lifesaving supplies,” he warned.

Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Hospital said it had received the bodies of 33 people killed in Israeli strikes since midnight.

The US-backed offensive on Gaza City began on Tuesday and came as a United Nations probe accused Israel of committing “genocide” in the Gaza Strip, saying Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior officials had incited the crime.

Israel rejected the findings and slammed it as “distorted and false”.

The United Nations estimated at the end of August that about one million people were living in Gaza City and its surroundings. Israel says 350,000 of them have fled.

Israel’s campaign has killed at least 65,141 people, also mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers reliable.