GAZA: Gaza’s civil defense agency said Zionist air strikes on Thursday killed at least 44 people, including 12 guards securing aid trucks. The latest bloodshed came after the UN General Assembly called for an immediate ceasefire in the devastated territory, where war has raged since Oct 2023. Seven guards were killed in a strike in Rafah, in southern Gaza, while another attack left five guards dead in nearby Khan Yunis, agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.

“The (Zionist) occupation once again targeted those securing the aid trucks,” Bassal told AFP. He added that around 30 people, most of them children, were wounded in the two strikes. “The trucks carrying flour were on their way to UNRWA warehouses,” Bassal noted, referring to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees. “The occupation aims to destroy all services for citizens across the Gaza Strip,” the spokesman said.

The United Nations and other aid agencies have repeatedly warned about the acute humanitarian crisis in the besieged Gaza Strip, exacerbated by the war that has persisted for more than 14 months. “Conditions for people across the Gaza Strip are appalling and apocalyptic,” UNRWA spokeswoman Louise Wateridge told journalists during a visit to Nuseirat in central Gaza. She added that life-saving aid to “besieged areas in north Gaza governorate has been largely blocked” since the Zionist military launched a sweeping assault there in early October. In southern Gaza, UNRWA said earlier this week it had

successfully delivered enough food aid for 200,000 people. But on Thursday it said “a serious incident” meant that only one truck out of a convoy of 70 travelling along Gaza’s southern border reached its destination. The agency called on “all parties to ensure safe, unimpeded and uninterrupted” aid deliveries.

As diplomacy aimed at ending the war appeared to be gaining pace again, the violence continued. The civil defense agency said Zionist air strikes on two homes near Nuseirat refugee camp and Gaza City killed 21 people including children. Fifteen people, at least six of them children, died “as a result of a (Zionist) bombing” of a building sheltering displaced people near Nuseirat, Bassal said. The bodies of six others killed in a strike on an apartment in Gaza City were taken to a hospital morgue, he added. In Khan Yunis, relatives gathered at the Nasser Hospital to mourn the dead and perform funeral rites.

In the latest diplomatic effort to secure an end the violence, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on Wednesday calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire. The non-binding resolution was rejected by the United States, the Zionist entity’s main military backer. However, in recent days, there have been indications that previously stalled ceasefire negotiations could be revived.

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who visited the Zionist entity on Thursday and met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said he “got the sense” that the Zionist leader was “ready to do a deal”. The Zionist offensive has killed at least 44,805 people in Gaza, a majority of them civilians. In the Zionist-occupied West Bank, where violence has surged since the Gaza war began, Zionist forces shot dead two Palestinians in separate raids in Nablus and Qalqilya. Around 810 Palestinians have been killed by Zionist forces in the West Bank since Oct 7, 2023. – Agencies