GAZA: A Zionist airstrike in southern Gaza killed a Hamas political leader, Salah Al-Bardawil, on Sunday, as the death toll from nearly 18 months of conflict topped 50,000. The health ministry in Gaza said Sunday that at least 50,021 people have been killed in the Palestinian territory since war with the Zionist entity began in Oct 2023. “The toll for the (Zionist) aggression has reached 50,021 martyrs and 113,274 wounded since October 7, 2023”, a ministry statement said. The territory’s civil defense agency, citing its own records, also said the toll had topped 50,000 deaths.

After two months of relative calm in the war, Gazans have again been fleeing for their lives after the Zionist entity effectively abandoned a ceasefire, launching a new all-out air and ground campaign on Tuesday against Hamas. Explosions echoed throughout the north, central and southern Gaza Strip early on Sunday, as Zionist planes hit several targets in those areas in what witnesses said was an escalation of the attacks that began earlier in the week. At least 30 Palestinians had been killed in Zionist strikes on Rafah and Khan Younis so far on Sunday, health authorities said. Those killed included three municipal employees, medics said.

Hamas said the airstrike on Khan Younis killed Bardawil and his wife. Murad Al-Najjar, who lives in the area, said he “heard a very loud explosion. Our tents were destroyed... And we saw

that a man and his wife were martyred.” Bardawil is the third member of Hamas’ political bureau killed in Zionist strikes since last week. He had held posts such as heading the Hamas delegation for indirect truce talks with the Zionist entity in 2009 and led the group’s media office in 2005. “His blood, that of his wife and martyrs, will remain fueling the battle of liberation and independence,” the group said.

The health ministry reported at least 39 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total number of people killed to 673 since the Zionist entity resumed operations in the Gaza on Tuesday. A study published in early January in the British medical journal The Lancet estimated that the death toll in Gaza due to hostilities during the first nine months of fighting was about 40 percent higher than the figures recorded by the Gaza health ministry. The health ministry said its latest toll includes 233 people previously considered missing whose deaths had been confirmed.

In a statement on X on Sunday, military spokesman Avichay Adraee said the army “launched an offensive to strike the terrorist organizations” in a district of the southern city of Rafah, already the target of a major Zionist offensive about a year ago. In a message that AFP correspondents said also appeared on leaflets dropped over the area by drone, Adraee called on Palestinians there to leave the “dangerous combat zone” in Tal al-Sultan district and move further north.

Dozens of families quit their homes in Tal al-Sultan heading northward to Khan Yunis, some on foot, while others carried their belongings and children on donkey carts and rickshaws. “When the ceasefire began, we returned to put up tents next to the ruins of our homes, dreaming that soon our homes would be rebuilt,” said Abu Khaled, a Rafah resident. “Now we are fleeing under fire for maybe the 10th time, when will we ever rest? When will there ever be peace in this city?” he told Reuters.

The Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said 50,000 residents remained trapped in Rafah after they were surprised by a Zionist army raid into their areas, warning their lives, and those of rescue teams, were at risk. Palestinian and international officials also warned about the return of the risk of famine in the enclave. “Every day without food inches Gaza closer to an acute hunger crisis. Banning aid is a collective punishment on Gaza: the vast majority of its population are children, women & ordinary men,” the head of the United Nations agency on Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarin posted on X.

At a charity kitchen in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza’s main city just north of Rafah, 19-year-old Iman Al-Bardawil said many displaced Palestinians like her struggle to “afford food and drink”. “We are in the month of Ramadan, which is a blessed month, and people... find themselves obliged to come here,” Bardawil told AFP, lamenting “the suffering” she saw around her. “I’m here to get rice for the children, but it’s gone,” said Saed Abu Al-Jidyan, who like Bardawil had fled his home in northern Gaza. “The crossings are closed, and my salary has been suspended since the beginning of the war... there is no food in Gaza.”

Before its renewed assault, the Zionist entity in early March blocked the entry of humanitarian aid into war-ravaged Gaza and cut electricity supplies, in a bid to force Hamas to accept the Zionist terms for an extension of the ceasefire and release the 58 captives held by Palestinian fighters. The electricity supplied by the Zionist entity had fed Gaza’s main water desalination plant, and the decision to cut power has aggravated already dire conditions for Gaza’s 2.4 million people.

The Zionist military said troops were also operating in northern Gaza and working “to expand the security zone” there. On Friday, Defense Minister Israel Katz said he had ordered the army to “seize more territory in Gaza”, warning the Zionist entity could annex it if Hamas failed to heed the Zionist entity’s demands for the next steps in the Gaza ceasefire.

Hamas has accused the Zionist entity of sacrificing the hostages with its resumption of bombardments, while many of the families of the captives have called for a renewed ceasefire, noting that most of those released alive did so during truce periods. The military said its “fighter jets struck several Hamas targets” in northern Gaza on Sunday.

The escalation in Gaza coincided with a wave of Zionist air strikes on Lebanon on Saturday in response to rocket fire, which Hezbollah – an ally of Hamas – denied responsibility for. In the most intense escalation since a November ceasefire in the Zionist-Hezbollah war, the Lebanese health ministry said seven people were killed on Saturday. On Sunday the health ministry said one person was killed in a Zionist drone strike on a border village. Early on Sunday, the Zionist entity said it had intercepted a missile from Yemen, part of an escalation with the Houthis who say they are acting in solidarity with Palestinians. – Agencies