Attack on Khan Younis kills 9 people, hours after Israel ordered mass evacuation

Palestinians who fled the eastern part of Khan Younis walk after the Israeli army ordered them to vacate their neighborhoods amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 1, 2024. Photo by Mohammed Salem/REUTERS

At least nine people were killed in an Israeli attack in the city of Khan Younis in the south of the Gaza Strip, Palestinian health officials said on Tuesday. Less than a day earlier, Israel had ordered the evacuation of parts of the city in advance of a likely ground operation.

The nighttime attack hit a house near the European Hospital, which is in the zone that Israel said was to be evacuated. After the first evacuation orders, the military said the facility itself was not affected, but the director said most patients and doctors had already been relocated.

READ MORE: Israel orders mass evacuation of Palestinians from Khan Younis

Sam Rose, planning director for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), said on Tuesday that the agency estimates there are about 250,000 people in the new exclusion zone – more than 10 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents – including many who fled earlier fighting. He says another 50,000 people living just outside the zone could also choose to flee because of their proximity to the fighting.

Israel estimated on Tuesday that 80 percent of all Palestinians in the Gaza Strip – up to 1.9 million people – now live together in the central region of the territory after many of them were expelled from Rafah by the Israeli military offensive.

Evacuees have been told to seek refuge in sprawling tent camps in a coastal region that is already overcrowded and lacking basic services. The war has largely disrupted the flow of food, medicine and essential goods to Gaza, and people there are now completely dependent on aid.

Israel began the war in the Gaza Strip after the October 7 Hamas attack, in which militants entered southern Israel, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting about 250.

Since then, more than 37,900 people have been killed in Gaza by Israeli ground offensives and bombings, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between fighters and civilians in its count. The UN’s top court has concluded that there is a “plausible risk of genocide” in Gaza – an accusation that Israel strongly denies.

Left:
Palestinians who fled the eastern part of Khan Younis walk after the Israeli army ordered them to vacate their neighborhoods amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 1, 2024. Photo by Mohammed Salem/REUTERS