On Sunday, health authorities said that 22 people, including 18 children, were killed in Israeli raids on the city of Rafah in southern Gaza. This comes as the United States is about to sanction billions of dollars in extra military assistance to Israel.
According to the adjacent Kuwaiti Hospital, which received the remains, a man, his wife, and their 3-year-old kid were murdered in the first Israeli strike in Rafah. Despite the woman’s pregnancy, the hospital said that the physicians rescued the baby. An extended family of seventeen children and two mothers were slain in the second blow.
Over half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have sought sanctuary in Rafah from the fighting elsewhere, and Israel has conducted air assaults on the city almost daily. Even while it has received pleas for moderation, particularly from the United States, it has pledged to escalate its ground attack against the Hamas terrorist organization to the city on the border with Egypt.
Local health professionals report that over 34,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israel-Hamas conflict, with women and children making up at least two-thirds of the casualties. It wreaked havoc and destroyed two of Gaza’s major cities. Eighty percent or more of the inhabitants of the beleaguered coastal enclave have already escaped.
Experts warn that Gaza is on the verge of starvation. On Saturday, the United States House of Representatives passed a $26 billion aid package, which includes over $9 billion in humanitarian supplies for the territory. President Joe Biden is expected to sign the agreement immediately, and it may clear the U.S. Senate as early as Tuesday.
Now in its seventh month, the battle has ignited regional tensions in the Middle East, with Iran and its affiliated extremist organizations taking the opposite side from Israel and the United States. There were concerns of a full-scale conflict when Israel and Iran exchanged direct fire last month.
Additionally, the Israeli-occupied West Bank has seen an increase in tensions.
