On foot and by donkey cart, thousands flee as Israel widens Gaza invasion

Thousands of Palestinian families have fled from the brunt of Israel's expanding ground invasion into Gaza's few remaining, overcrowded refuges, as the military launched heavy strikes across the center and south of the territory, killing dozens, Palestinian health officials said.

On foot or riding donkey carts loaded with belongings, a stream of people flowed into Deir al Balah — a town that normally has a population of around 75,000. It has been overwhelmed by several hundred thousand people driven from northern Gaza as the region was pounded to rubble.

Because UN shelters are packed many times over capacity, the new arrivals set up tents on sidewalks for the cold winter night. Most crowded onto streets around the town's main hospital, Al Aqsa Martyrs, hoping it would be safer from Israeli strikes. Still, no place is safe in Gaza.

Israeli invasion and indiscriminate bombing are crowding most of the population into Deir al-Balah and Rafah at the territory's southern edge as well as a tiny rural area by the southern coastline. Those areas continue to be hit by Israeli strikes that regularly crush homes full of people.

Israel has rejected global calls for ceasefire and vows to expand its war in the tiny enclave. Israel's invasion in Gaza has already been one of the most devastating military campaigns in recent history. More than 21,100 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Some 85% of Gaza's population of 2.4 million people have fled their homes. UN officials say a quarter of Gaza's population is starving under brutal Israeli siege, which allows in only a trickle of food, water, fuel and other supplies.

The latest people to be displaced fled from several built-up refugee camps in central Gaza targeted in the latest phase of Israel's ground assault. One of the camps, Bureij, came under heavy bombardment throughout the night as Israeli troops moved in.

Exodus after exodus

"It was a night of hell. We haven't seen such bombing since the start of the war," said Rami Abu Mosab, speaking from Bureij, where he has sheltered since fleeing his home in northern Gaza.

The Israeli military issued an ultimatum, warning people of Bureij and neighbouring areas to flee on Tuesday. The area was home to nearly 90,000 people before the war and now shelters more than 61,000 displaced people, mostly from the north, according to the UN.

Bureij camp, like others in Gaza, houses refugees from the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation and their descendants and now resembles other densely populated neighbourhoods. It was not known how many were fleeing.

In Deir al-Balah over the past two days, empty lots have filled up with families in tents or sleeping on blankets on the ground.

This was the third move further south for Ibrahim al Zatari, a daily labourer. First he, his wife and four children fled and moved in with relatives in Gaza City after a strike flattened their home in northern Gaza.

Later, they fled to Bureij to escape fighting in the city.

On Wednesday morning, they made an hours-long journey on foot to Deir al Balah, where — like many others — they wandered the streets looking for an empty spot to lie down. "There is no foothold here," he said. "Where should we go?"

With much of northern Gaza leveled, Palestinians fear a similar fate awaits other areas, including Khan Younis, where Israeli forces launched ground invasion in early December. The Israeli military said on Wednesday it deployed another brigade in the city, a sign of the tough fighting.

Israeli shelling on Wednesday struck a residential building in Khan Younis next to Al Amal Hospital, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent, which runs the facility. Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf al Qidra said at least 20 people were killed and dozens more wounded. Footage from the scene showed several torn bodies lying in the street as rescue workers loaded a man whose legs had been severed onto a stretcher.

Israel's war on besieged civilians

Gaza's devastation has been massive.

Israel has said Hamas resistance group must be destroyed after its its October 7 blitz in which some 1,150 people — including hundreds of soldiers were killed.

The Palestinian resistance group Hamas says its October 7 blitz on Israel that surprised its arch-enemy was orchestrated in response to Israeli attacks on Al Aqsa Mosque, illegal settler violence in occupied West Bank and to put Palestine question "back on the table."

In an assault of startling breadth, Hamas gunmen rolled into as many as 22 locations outside Gaza, including towns and other communities as far as 24 kilometres from the Gaza fence.

In some places they are said to have gunned down many soldiers as Israel's military scrambled to muster a response.

And upon return to Gaza, they also took along some 240 hostages, including Israeli military personnel and civilians. Dozens of the captives were later exchanged for Palestinians incarcerating in Israeli dungeons.

Since then, Israel has heavily bombarded Gaza from air, land and sea, killing more than 21,000 Palestinians, mostly children [8,800] and women, wounding more than 55,000 and displacing nearly two million people in the tiny coastal enclave. Hamas and other groups have killed 164 Israeli soldiers in the ongoing fighting.