Israeli onslaught kills scores in Gaza as Trump visits Gulf states
Cairo: Israeli military strikes killed at least 85 people in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, Palestinian medics said, as the United States and Arab mediators pushed for a ceasefire deal and US President Donald Trump visited the Middle East.
Most of the victims, including women and children, were killed in Khan Younis in southern Gaza in airstrikes that hit homes and tents, they said.
The dead included journalist Hassan Samour, who worked for the Hamas-run Aqsa radio station and was killed along with 11 family members when their home was hit, the medics said.
The Israeli military said its air force had struck 130 targets used by militant groups in Gaza over the past two days.
Israel has intensified its offensive in Gaza as it tries to eradicate Hamas in retaliation for the deadly attacks the Palestinian militant group carried out on Israel in 2023.
In Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, the health ministry said an Israeli strike on Al-Tawba medical clinic killed at least 15 people and wounded several others. It took Thursday's death toll to 85, medics said.
Hamas said in a statement that Israel was making a 'desperate attempt to negotiate under cover of fire' as indirect ceasefire talks take place, also involving Trump envoys and Qatar and Egyptian mediators in Doha.
Palestinians on Thursday commemorated the 'Nakba', or catastrophe, when hundreds of thousands fled or were forced to flee their towns and villages during the 1948 war that gave birth to Israel.
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