20 dead as Israeli forces roll back into Gaza – World

• ICRC says medics struggling to cope with spike in casualties
• UNOPS staffer killed in ‘Israeli strike’
• Health ministry records nearly 1,000 deaths over 48 hours
• World leaders flay resumption of hostilities

GAZA: Long lines of fleeing civilians filled the roads on Wednesday after the Israeli military announced its forces had resumed ground operations in the central and southern Gaza Strip.

A second day of airstrikes claimed the lives of at least 20 Palestinians, as Israel extended its control over the Netzarim Corridor, which bisects Gaza, to create a partial buffer zone between the north and the south of the enclave.

The renewed ground operations come a day after more than 400 Palestinians were killed in airstrikes in one of the deadliest days since the beginning of the conflict, shattering a ceasefire has largely held since January.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) warned on Wednesday that medics were struggling to manage a sharp increase in casualties over the last 36 hours due to the resumption of ground operations by Israel.

Meanwhile, the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS) said that one of its workers was killed and five wounded when an explosive was “dropped or fired” at its headquarters in the central Gaza Strip.

UNOPS chief Jorge Moreira da Silva said in a statement that he was “shocked and devastated” by the staff member’s death. “This was not an accident,” he said, adding that “attacks against humanitarian premises are a breach of international law” and that UN personnel and premises “must be protected by all sides”.

970 deaths in two days

The war death toll updated daily by the health ministry showed an increase of 970 in the space of 48 hours, though AFP could not confirm how many of them were recorded as casualties from the strikes.

The death toll from the war in the Gaza recorded by the ministry at midday on Monday stood at 48,577. By midday on Wednesday, the figure had risen to 49,547, it said. Israel launched a wave of strikes on Gaza overnight between Monday and Tuesday, by far the deadliest since a fragile truce began in January.

Families with young children fled northern Gaza for areas further south, fearing for their lives after Israel urged civilians to leave areas it described as “combat zones”.

Governments in the Middle East, Europe and beyond called for the renewed hostilities to end.

“The resumption of Israeli strikes yesterday (Tuesday), despite the efforts of mediators, represents a dramatic step backwards,” said French President Emmanuel Macron ahead of talks with Jordan’s King Abdullah II.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said Israel’s raids on Gaza “are shattering the tangible hopes of so many Israelis and Palestinians of an end to suffering on all sides”.

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said she told her Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar that the new strikes on Gaza were “unacceptable”.

Both Egypt and Qatar, which brokered the Gaza ceasefire alongside the United States, condemned Israel’s resort to military action.

Negotiations have stalled over how to proceed with a ceasefire — whose first phase expired in early March. Israel and the US have sought to change the terms of the deal by extending stage one. That would delay the start of phase two, which was meant to establish a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and was swiftly rejected by Hamas, which demanded full implementation of the original deal.

Israel and the US have portrayed Hamas’s rejection of an extended stage one as a refusal to release more Israeli prisoners in exchange for Palestinian ones.

Published in Dawn, March 20th, 2025