Residents report Israeli forces have ordered a new evacuation

CAIRO: Israeli forces conducting a weeks-long offensive in northern Gaza on Sunday ordered any remaining residents of Beit Hanoun to leave, citing Palestinian militant rocket fire from the area, residents reported.

The instruction triggered a new wave of displacement, although the number of people affected remained unclear. Israel says its nearly three-month-old campaign in northern Gaza targets Hamas militants to prevent them regrouping. The military claims civilian evacuation orders aim to keep people safe.

However, Palestinian and UN officials argue no place in Gaza is safe, and evacuations worsen the population’s humanitarian conditions. Much of the area around Beit Hanoun, Jabalia, and Beit Lahiya has been depopulated and razed, raising speculation that Israel plans to retain it as a buffer zone after the conflict.

The Israeli military announced its latest push into Beit Hanoun on Saturday.

The Palestinian Civil Emergency Service reported losing contact with those still trapped in the town and being unable to send rescue teams due to the incursion. Later on Sunday, medics said an Israeli airstrike killed seven people in a house in Beit Hanoun. Israel has yet to comment.

On Friday, Israeli forces raided Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, claiming militants used it—a charge Hamas denies. The raid rendered the hospital, one of three key facilities in northern Gaza, inoperative, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Some patients were evacuated to the Indonesian Hospital, which is also non-functional, while others were taken elsewhere.

On Sunday, health officials reported an Israeli tank shell striking the upper floor of Al-Ahly Arab Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, near its X-ray division.

Medics said Israeli strikes across Gaza killed at least 23 people that day, including seven at Al-WAFA Hospital, where others were also injured.

The military stated the strike targeted Hamas’s “Aerial Defence Unit,” claiming the compound no longer functioned as a hospital and was used to plan attacks.

Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed over 45,300 Palestinians, according to Hamas-run health officials. Most of the enclave’s 2.3 million population have been displaced, with vast destruction across the territory.

The conflict began after a Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killed 1,200 people and led to 251 hostages being taken to Gaza, according to

Israeli authorities.