People evacuate from the Tuffah neighbourhood in the east of Gaza City yesterday.
Palestinians fled eastern Gaza City yesterday under heavy bombardment as the Israeli military issued an evacuation order for the area it had previously declared clear of Hamas fighters.
The flare-up in the northern Gaza Strip’s Shujaiya district, which witnesses and medics said caused numerous casualties, comes as fears grow of a wider regional conflagration involving Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah, a Hamas ally.
In Gaza, fighting has ground on despite comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the “intense phase” of the war – now nearing its 10th month – was winding down.
The civil defence agency in the Hamas-run territory and medics said Israeli strikes overnight and early yesterday killed at least five people in Gaza City and another in Beit Lahia, also in the north.
In Gaza City, a witness said the situation was “very difficult and frightening” as Israeli military vehicles approached the area amid air strikes and shelling.
“Residents are running through the streets in terror... a number of wounded and martyrs lie in the streets.”
The military’s Arabic-language spokesman, Avichay Adraee, told residents and displaced Gazans in the Shujaiya area to leave “for your safety”, in a message posted on social media.
They were asked to head south, to a declared “humanitarian zone” about 25km away.
