Death toll from Israeli raid in W Bank hits 20

The death toll from a three-day Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank rose to 20 Friday, Israel and the Palestinian health ministry said, while violence raged on in the Gaza Strip.It came as US-based aid group Anera said an Israeli strike killed four Palestinians accompanying its convoy on Thursday.The UN's World Food Programme on Wednesday said it had suspended aid operations after one of its vehicles was hit by an Israeli strike.In the US, Vice-President Kamala Harris pledged she would not change Washington's policy of supplying weapons to Israel if elected to the top job in November. But she stressed it was time to "end this war" in Gaza.Israeli troops pulled back from other West Bank towns late Thursday but fighting raged on around Jenin.Friday evening an AFP photographer reported that gunfire and explosions were ongoing in Jenin.In Gaza, Israeli artillery pounded western areas of Gaza City early Friday, an AFP journalist said, while a medical source at the southern Nasser Hospital said an Israeli strike killed three people near the southern city of Khan Younis.The World Health Organisation said Israel had agreed to at least three days of "humanitarian pauses" in parts of Gaza, starting Sunday, to facilitate a vaccination drive after the territory recorded its first case of polio in a quarter of a century.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the measures were "not a ceasefire".The Israeli assault on the West Bank has caused significant destruction, especially in Tulkarem, whose governor Mustafa Taqatqa described the raids as "unprecedented" and a "dangerous signal".The Palestinian Prisoners' Club advocacy group said at least 45 people had been detained in the West Bank since Wednesday.Britain Friday said it was "deeply" concerned by the raids, urging Israel to "exercise restraint" and adhere to international law.France said the Israeli operations "worsen a climate of unprecedented instability and violence", while Spain denounced "an outbreak of violence which is clearly unacceptable".Israeli shelling in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza killed two people Friday, the civil defence agency in the Hamas-ruled territory said.The acting head of the UN humanitarian office (OCHA), Joyce Msuya, said "more than 88% of Gaza's territory has come under an (Israeli) order to evacuate at some point", adding civilians were being forced into just 11% of the Gaza Strip."It forces us to ask: what has become of our basic sense of humanity?" OCHA Friday said that "in August, the number of humanitarian missions and movements within Gaza that have been denied access by Israeli authorities has almost doubled, compared with July".Israel's military campaign has killed at least 40,602 people in Gaza, according to the territory's health ministry. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.The war has devastated Gaza, repeatedly displaced most of its 2.4mn people and triggered a humanitarian crisis.