Per the latest figures from the Health Ministry in Gaza, at least 19,667 people have been killed due to Israeli attacks in the enclave since the start of the war.
The number of people wounded also rose to 52,586, the ministry said, adding that more than 7,700 children have been killed.
The Health Ministry said that it is “surprised” at what it called the “silence” of the international community amid the continuing attacks by Israeli forces in the north.
Spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra said “massacres” in the area were taking place in the absence of health services due to the “destruction of hospitals” by the Israeli army.
“It means the (Israeli) occupation insists on the genocide of the population,” he added.
Ashraf al-Qudra also provided an update on the situation at al-Awda Hospital in northern Gaza.
He stated that Israeli forces have turned the hospital into a military barracks and have detained 240 people, including 80 medical staff, 40 patients, and 120 displaced people, inside the hospital.
He added that Israeli forces have arrested six hospital staff, including the Director of the facility, Ahmed Muhanna.
Meanwhile, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) disclosed that after two months of war, Palestinians in Gaza are now cornered in the south, where Israeli strikes on what was supposed to be a safe zone prove that nowhere is safe.
“At Nasser hospital [in Khan Younis, in southern Gaza], the emergency department is completely full and new patients are being treated on the floor,” the charity said in a statement.
“Doctors are stepping over bodies of dead children to treat other children who will die anyway,” Chris Hook, MSF medical team leader in Gaza revealed.
“The lucky few that survive have life-changing injuries. Many injured people suffer from extreme burns, major fractures that won’t heal properly and may go on to require amputations,” Hook said.
Separately, UNRWA announced that more than 60 percent of the infrastructure in Gaza has been destroyed or damaged.
UNRWA also said that more than 90 percent of the population in Gaza have been displaced.
“This is a staggering and unprecedented level of destruction and forced displacement, taking place in front of our eyes,” it added.
UNICEF’s spokesperson James Elder said on X, “Without sufficient safe water, food and sanitation that only a humanitarian ceasefire can bring – child deaths due to disease could surpass those killed in bombardments.”
French Foreign Minister Repeats Call For Truce
Also on Tuesday, French Foreign Minister, Catherine Colonna echoed her call for a truce between Israel and Hamas.
“I believe our efforts converge to … wish for another immediate, lasting truce,” Colonna said in a joint news conference with her British counterpart David Cameron in Paris.
Colonna also said that France would take measures along with the country’s partners to put an end to Houthi attacks in the Red Sea.
Cameron said at the news conference that the UK also wants a “ceasefire as soon as possible, but it must be a sustainable ceasefire.”
Meanwhile, a group of military experts, diplomats and academics, in a letter, urged UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron to call for an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza.
“We firmly believe it is in the interest of both Israeli and Palestinian civilians, and indeed the whole region, for the current hostilities to de-escalate,” the letter, signed by the former head of the British army and 13 others, asserted.
It added, “The UK does not have to follow America’s lead – particularly when US public and opinion is far from united.”
While the experts noted the government’s “slight positive change in tone” in recent days, they said the UK’s consistent “rejection of an immediate ceasefire was strategically ill-advised and morally indefensible”.
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