Israeli forces launched a series of deadly airstrikes and ground attacks across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, killing several Palestinians, including children, in the southern city of Khan Younis.

The assaults bring the number of Palestinians killed since the truce was announced to 360, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, with the overall death toll from the ongoing war now surpassing a staggering 70,000.

The most lethal strike hit a residential area in Khan Younis, where families displaced by earlier Israeli bombardments had sought shelter. The attack killed five Palestinians, among them two children, in what local sources described as a massacre of civilians trapped with nowhere safe to go. Earlier, Israeli forces targeted a displaced persons' tent near the Kuwaiti Hospital in the al-Mawasi area, a zone Israel itself had previously designated as "safe," spreading panic among a population forcibly displaced multiple times.

The violence was not confined to the south. In eastern Gaza City, Israeli armored vehicles unleashed heavy machine-gun fire in the al-Shujaiya neighborhood, accompanied by sustained artillery shelling along Salah al-Din Street—a critical route for civilians attempting to flee bombardment. An Israeli drone dropped an explosive device at a central junction, while illumination bombs signaled preparations for further raids.

In Rafah, another so-called "safe zone" overwhelmed with displaced families, Israeli artillery pounded eastern neighborhoods, continuing a pattern of attacks on areas where Israel has ordered civilians to concentrate.

The Gaza Health Ministry reported that hospitals received five more martyrs and 13 wounded in the last 48 hours, with civil defense teams recovering 617 bodies from under rubble during the same period—many decomposed, a grim testament to Israel's ongoing restriction of rescue operations.

As the health system collapses under Israel's siege and direct attacks, medical evacuations have become a matter of life and death. Doctors Without Borders (MSF) issued a desperate appeal Wednesday, warning that children are dying due to delayed evacuations and bureaucratic obstacles.

"The number of patients accepted abroad so far is just a drop in the ocean," said Hani Islim, MSF’s medical evacuation coordinator, noting the real need is three to four times higher. He recounted evacuating children aged two months to 16 years suffering from war-exacerbated heart conditions, cancer, and severe injuries, many requiring immediate surgery.

Islim condemned the "shopping list" approach of receiving countries, where lengthy visa processes and funding decisions cost lives. He highlighted a cruel disparity: while some countries accept children, they refuse adults, who constitute three-quarters of those needing urgent care.

The Ministry's latest report, dated December 3, 2025, confirms 70,117 Palestinians killed and 170,999 injured since the war began on October 7, 2023. Health officials stress that thousands more remain missing, presumed dead under rubble that Israeli forces block rescuers from reaching.

The latest attacks confirm that for Gaza's 2.3 million besieged residents, ceasefires declarations have provided no reprieve from the relentless violence of occupation. With the international community failing to enforce its own calls for peace or to open borders to the critically wounded, Palestinians continue to pay the ultimate price for global inaction. (ILKHA)