CAIRO/GAZA: Israel issued new evacuation orders for Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on Sunday evening, forcing more families to flee, saying the forces intended to take action against the militant group Hamas and others operating in the area. Israel has issued several evacuation orders across Gaza in recent days, the highest since the start of the 10-month war, prompting protests from Palestinians, the United Nations and relief officials over the shrinking humanitarian zones and the absence of safe areas.
The Deir Al-Balah municipality says Israeli evacuation orders have so far displaced 250,000 people.
Israeli military strikes killed at least seven Palestinians on Monday, doctors said. Two were killed in Deir Al-Balah, where about a million people had taken refuge, two in a school in Al-Nuseirat camp and three in the southern city of Rafah, near the border with Egypt.
The new orders have forced many families and patients to abandon Al-Aqsa Hospital, the main medical facility in Deir Al-Balah, where hundreds of thousands of residents and displaced people had taken refuge, fearing bombing.
The hospital is located near the area affected by the evacuation notice.
Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said in a statement on X on Sunday evening that an explosion about 250 meters (820 feet) away from the MSF-supported Al-Aqsa hospital had sparked panic.
“As a result, MSF is considering temporarily suspending wound care, while seeking to maintain life-saving treatments.”
Quoting the Gaza Health Ministry, of the approximately 650 patients, only 100 are still hospitalized, seven of them in intensive care.
“This situation is unacceptable. Al Aqsa has been operating well beyond its capacity for weeks due to the lack of alternatives for patients. All parties to the conflict must respect the hospital, as well as patients' access to medical care,” he added.
STATE OF DIPLOMATIC IMPASSAGE
Sawasn Abu Afesh said she and her children have been displaced 11 times.
“I left half of my children behind me near my furniture and now I am with my little ones and my daughter, only God can help us… I have no money for transportation, I will go to area 17 where my family will be on foot. I brought my children and three are left behind. I have no idea where,” the woman said.
The escalation comes with little hope of an end in sight to the war, as diplomacy by mediators Qatar, Egypt and the United States has so far failed to bridge the gap between Israel and Hamas, whose leaders have traded blame for the lack of agreement.
Neither Hamas nor Israel accepted the numerous compromises presented by mediators during talks in Cairo on Sunday, two Egyptian security sources said.
A senior U.S. official, however, described the talks as “constructive,” saying they were conducted in the spirit of all parties reaching “a final and workable agreement.”
Hamas official Osama Hamdan said the group rejected new conditions posed by Israel during the talks, which it did not attend, and added that U.S. comments about an imminent ceasefire agreement were false and aimed at election purposes.
US President Joe Biden and his administration have faced growing protests in the United States over aid to Israel ahead of the November elections.
More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, according to Gaza's health ministry. The crowded enclave has been devastated, with most of its 2.3 million residents displaced multiple times and facing severe shortages of food and medicine, aid agencies say.
The war was triggered by Hamas's attack on Israel on October 7, in which, according to Israeli estimates, 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 were taken hostage.
