Israel orders ‘all residents of Gaza City’ to leave

The Israeli army has ordered all residents of Gaza City to evacuate south to the center of the Gaza Strip, as part of intensified operations in the north.

Air-dropped leaflets call on “everyone in Gaza City” to leave what is described as a “dangerous combat zone” by taking designated safe routes – marked by two roads that lead to shelters in Deir al-Balah and al-Zawaida.

The UN has expressed deep concern over the evacuation orders. This is the second time since the start of the war that the entire city of Gaza has been ordered to evacuate.

Over the past two weeks, Israeli forces have returned to several districts where the army says Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters have been regrouping since the beginning of the year.

Hamas said the resumption of Israeli activities in the city was threatens to derail negotiations Talks resumed in Qatar on Wednesday, in the presence of the heads of Egyptian, American and Israeli intelligence services, as well as the Qatari prime minister.

A senior Hamas official, Hossam Badran, told AFP that Israel was “trying to put pressure on the negotiations by intensifying bombing operations, displacement and committing massacres.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stressed Israel’s commitment to a deal provided “Israel’s red lines are preserved.”

More than a quarter of a million people are estimated to still live in Gaza City – and some have been seen evacuating south.

Others, however, were unwilling to leave.

“I will not leave Gaza (city). I will not make the stupid mistake that others have made. Israeli missiles do not differentiate between north and south,” Ibrahim al-Barbari, a 47-year-old resident, told the BBC.

“If death is my destiny and that of my children, we will die with honor and dignity in our homes,” he said.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said it had received calls from some residents who were unable to leave their homes due to the intensity of the shelling.

“Reports from Gaza City show that residents are living in tragic conditions. The (Israeli) occupation forces continue to strike residential neighborhoods and displace people from their homes and shelters,” he added.

In a statement released earlier Wednesday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said its troops “carried out a counter-terrorism operation” overnight against Hamas and PIJ fighters operating inside the headquarters of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in Gaza City.

Troops opened a “defined corridor to facilitate the evacuation of civilians” from the area before entering the structure and “eliminated the terrorists in close combat,” he added.

UNRWA had no immediate comment.

The Israeli military also said it killed dozens of fighters in the Shejaiya district, east of Gaza City, and dismantled an underground tunnel over the past day.

Speaking in the Israeli parliament on Wednesday, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that 60 percent of Hamas fighters had been killed or wounded since the start of the Israeli offensive. The BBC was unable to independently verify these figures.

On Tuesday, the United Nations Human Rights Office said he was “appalled”“ by the IDF ordering residents to evacuate to “areas where Israeli military operations are underway and civilians continue to be killed and injured.”

She also warned that the Deir al-Balah area was already severely overcrowded by Palestinians displaced from other areas of Gaza and that there was little infrastructure and limited access to humanitarian aid.

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza to destroy the Hamas group in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 7, in which some 1,200 people were killed and 251 others taken hostage.

Since then, more than 38,295 people have been killed in Gaza, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry. Its figures do not distinguish between civilians and fighters, but it reportedly identified 14,680 children, women and the elderly among the dead as of late April.