Tel Aviv [Israel], March 16: At least nine people, including two journalists, were killed in an Israeli drone attack in northern Gaza on Saturday, according to Palestinian sources.
Medical staff reported that members of a rescue team operating in the northern town of Beit Lahia were among the victims, as well as the photojournalists, a media spokesman and a driver.
The Palestinian Journalists' Protection Center said in a statement that Israel killed "three journalists in an airstrike on a media team documenting relief efforts in northern Gaza". "The journalists were documenting humanitarian relief efforts for those affected by Israel's genocidal war," the statement added, according to Anadolu.
The Israeli military confirmed the attack but provided no information about those killed or injured. It said it had previously identified two terrorists from the Palestinian group Hamas operating a drone in Beit Lahia, which posed a threat to nearby Israeli troops.
It said other terrorists then collected the drone equipment and boarded a vehicle. The Israeli military attacked this group as well.
The claims from both sides could not initially be independently verified.
Hamas has issued a statement about the deadly Israeli attack on Beit Lahiya, calling it a "horrific massacre" and "a continuation" of Israeli "war crimes against our people and a dangerous escalation that reflects its insistence on continuing its aggression and disregard for all international laws and conventions".
"This criminal escalation, accompanied by deliberate killings and barbaric shelling across the Gaza Strip, reaffirms the occupation's intention to undermine the ceasefire agreement and its deliberate sabotage of any opportunity to complete the implementation of the agreement and exchange prisoners, in blatant defiance of the mediators and the international community," Hamas said.
The Palestinian group also called on the mediators to pressure Israel's Prime Minister Netanyahu to move forward with implementing the agreed ceasefire and prisoner exchange.
Meanwhile, the Gaza Government Media Office has said that the Gaza Strip is on the brink of collapse. In an official statement, it said the vast majority of Gaza's municipalities have stopped waste collection due to the fuel shortages, alongside also the street clearing and the removal of rubble.
It has been a predictable outcome of the ongoing Israeli ban on the entry of much-needed fuel and food, and the crisis now is escalating.
Families right now are struggling to afford the meal to break their fast during Ramadan, another sign of a crisis that has no end in sight.
Source: Qatar Tribune
