Fresh Israeli blitz kills dozens in Gaza

GAZA:

Dozens were killed or unaccounted for in Gaza on Thursday after Israeli strikes, on the day the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the war.

One strike near the Kamal Adwan hospital in the north of the territory left "dozens of people" dead or missing, the facility's director Hossam Abu Safiya told AFP.

Another strike was reported in a neighbourhood of Gaza City, with civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal saying 22 were dead.

"There is a headless body. We don't yet know who this is," Moataz al-Arouqi, who lives in the area, told AFP.

Since Hamas conducted the October 7, 2023 attack, the deadliest in Israeli history, Israel has been fighting a war in Gaza, which the militant group rules.

It vows to crush Hamas and to bring home the hostages seized by the group during the attack.

Israel has faced growing international criticism over its conduct of the Gaza war, including from its allies, despite global solidarity with the victims of October 7.

Israel is also fighting Hamas ally Hezbollah in Lebanon. Both groups are backed by Israel's arch-foe Iran.

On Thursday, US envoy Amos Hochstein was due to meet Netanyahu to seek a truce in the war in Lebanon.

Hochstein's meetings in Lebanon this week appeared to indicate some progress in efforts to end that war.

The health ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza said the death toll from the resulting war has reached 44,056 people, the majority civilians. The United Nations considers the figures reliable.

47 killed Lebanon strikes

Israeli strikes killed at least 47 people in eastern Lebanon on Thursday, a Lebanese official said, pressing the campaign against Hezbollah

Bachir Khodr, governor of Lebanon's Baalbek-Hermel province, said at least 47 were killed and 22 wounded in Israeli strikes in the Baalbek region.

Posting on X, he said rescue operations were underway. The region bordering Syria is an area of Lebanon where Hezbollah holds sway. Beirut shook as Israeli airstrikes hit the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs about a dozen times, sending up clouds of debris, in some of the most intense airstrikes yet.