‘Systematic Policy’ – Israel Targeted 65 Shelters for Displaced in Gaza from August to October

By Palestine Chronicle Staff  

The targeting included “shelling, directing shootings, killing forcibly displaced people and their families, or making them leave schools-turned-shelters under fire and/or with orders to relocate.”

From August to October this year, the Israeli army targeted 65 shelters housing the displaced across the Gaza Strip, killing 672 Palestinians and injuring more than 1,000, according to the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.

During October alone, buildings used as shelters were targeted 39 times, including schools, hospitals, clinics and halls. Fifty-seven of the targeted locations were in either Gaza City or the northern Gaza Strip, while the remaining eight were in the central part of the besieged enclave, Euro-Med said in a recent report.

The targeting included “shelling, directing shootings, killing forcibly displaced people and their families, or making them leave schools-turned-shelters under fire and/or with orders to relocate,” the report said.

“These schools are then burned or otherwise destroyed by Israeli forces in order to render them uninhabitable and stop displaced people from returning to them,” the report added.

Families Separated

The most recent Israeli targeting of shelters and ensuing waves of forced displacement in the north “have caused dozens of Palestinian families to be dispersed and their members to be separated from one another, which has doubled their psychological suffering, and especially that of the children.”

The Euro-Med Monitor field team reported, on October 27, that the Israeli army bombed the Asmaa School in the Al-Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza City.

Infographic | One of the most dangerous strategies employed by Israel as part of its genocide and plan to empty northern Gaza of its Palestinian residents is the targeting of shelters where they seek refuge from systematic attacks on their homes and neighbourhoods.

In this… pic.twitter.com/BroENIRpLl

— Euro-Med Monitor (@EuroMedHR) October 31, 2024

The school-turned-shelter was home to thousands of displaced people, and the bombing killed 11 Palestinians – including four journalists, two of whom were women – and injured dozens more. The Israeli air force had bombed the same school eight days prior, killing eight Palestinians and injuring others.

A previous airstrike targeted the Shuhada Al-Nuseirat Secondary School for Boys on October 24, the report said.

This school “was home to thousands of displaced people in the central Gaza Strip’s Nuseirat refugee camp, and the bombing killed 18 Palestinians, including 12 children and three women, and injured 52 more”, according to the Euro-Med Monitor field team.

‘Annex and Settle’

The rights body said that Israel’s “systematic policy of destroying shelters further restricts the options available to residents in terms of places to seek refuge,” which aids Israel to “achieve its objectives of destroying and forcibly displacing Palestinians and altering the demographic makeup of the Strip.”

‘Gaza is Ours, Forever’ – Israel’s ‘Strategy’ of Ethnic Cleansing in Gaza

“This is particularly apparent in northern Gaza, where Israeli officials with varying degrees of authority have made it clear they intend to annex and settle,” Euro-Med Monitor said.

The organization pointed out that “at least 10 schools in northern Gaza are currently being evacuated by the Israeli occupation army” and the majority of them were set on fire.

No Prior Notice

The evacuation of these schools occurred after the Israeli army “sent quadcopters or Palestinian detainees and told those inside to leave and head to checkpoints.”

Some of these schools were bombed without any prior notice, such as the Jabalia Preparatory School, in which 10 displaced people were killed on October 21, and the Zaid Bin Haritha School, in which seven displaced people were killed on October 22, said Euro-Med Monitor.

AL-JAZEERA:

The Israeli occupation army is blowing up residential buildings around Jabaliya camp, in northern Gaza.

Heavy Israeli shelling was reported on the Al-Fakhoura area in the Jabaliya camp. pic.twitter.com/NeG86idSDq

— The Palestine Chronicle (@PalestineChron) November 4, 2024

The rights body called on all nations “to fulfill heir international obligations by preventing Israel from completing the crime of genocide and other serious crimes in the Gaza Strip,” and ensure “Israel abides by international law and the rulings of the International Court of Justice; enforcing effective sanctions against it; and halting all forms of military, financial, and political support and cooperation.”

Over 43,000 Killed

Flouting a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire, Israel has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza.

Currently on trial before the International Court of Justice for genocide against Palestinians, Israel has been waging a devastating war on Gaza since October 7.

Civil Defense Pleads for Aid – 100,000 Civilians Trapped in Northern Gaza

According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 43,374 Palestinians have, to date, been killed, and 102,261 wounded. Moreover, at least 11,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.

Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.

Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.

Millions Displaced

The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.

The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.

Later in the war, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians began moving from the south to central Gaza in a constant search for safety.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

The post ‘Systematic Policy’ – Israel Targeted 65 Shelters for Displaced in Gaza from August to October  appeared first on Palestine Chronicle.