Palestinians shelter in a tent camp near a wastewater pool, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 15, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Israel hammered the Gaza Strip from the air, sea and land on Monday as the war in the Palestinian territory showed no sign of abating, with Hamas saying it was pulling out of truce talks.

Shells rained down on the neighbourhoods of Tal Al-Hawa, Sheikh Ajlin and Al-Sabra in Gaza City, AFP correspondents reported, while eyewitnesses said the Israeli Army had shelled the Al-Mughraqa area and the northern outskirts of the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

Paramedics from the Palestinian Red Crescent said they had retrieved the bodies of five persons, including three children, after Israeli air strikes in the Al-Maghazi camp, also in the central Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, eyewitnesses reported Israeli gunship fire east of Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, and shelling and Apache helicopter attacks in western areas of the southernmost city of Rafah.

The Israeli military said in a statement that it was continuing its activity throughout the coastal territory, and said it had conducted raids in Rafah and central Gaza that killed “a number of” militants, as well as air strikes throughout the strip over the past day.

It also said its naval forces had been firing at targets in Gaza.

Talks on hold

The relentless bombardments came as prospects dwindled for a truce and hostage release deal being secured any time soon.

Hamas, the Iran-backed Islamist group that Israel has been fighting in Gaza for over nine months, said on Sunday it was withdrawing from ceasefire talks.

The decision followed an Israeli strike targeting the head of Hamas’s military wing, Mohammed Deif, which the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said killed 92 people.

Deif’s fate remains unknown, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying there was “no certainty” he was dead while a senior Hamas official told AFP that Deif was “well and directly overseeing” operations.

Speaking after the strike on al-Mawasi, a second senior official from the militant group cited Israeli “massacres” and its attitude to negotiations as a reason for suspending negotiations.

But according to the official, Haniyeh told international mediators Hamas was “ready to resume negotiations” when Israel’s government “demonstrates seriousness in reaching a ceasefire agreement and a prisoner exchange deal”.

Last week, U.S. President Joe Biden had suggested a deal might be close, saying at a NATO summit that both sides had agreed to a framework he had set out in late May.

Hamas on Monday lashed out at the U.S., accusing it of supporting “genocide” by supplying Israel with “internationally banned” weapons.

“We condemn in the strongest terms the… American disdain for the blood of the children and women of our Palestinian people… by providing all types of prohibited weapons to the ‘Israeli’ occupation,” a statement from the Hamas government media office said.

Talks between the warring parties have been mediated by Qatar and Egypt, with U.S. support, but months of negotiations have failed to bring a breakthrough.

School hit

The war was sparked by Hamas’s surprise October 7 attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

The militants also seized 251 hostages, 116 of whom are still in Gaza including 42 the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel responded with a military offensive that has killed at least 38,584 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to data provided by the Gaza health ministry.

The war and accompanying siege have devastated the Palestinian territory, destroying much of its infrastructure, leaving the majority of its 2.4 million residents displaced and causing a dire shortage of food, medicines and other basic goods.

Among the devastated facilities have been multiple schools. On Sunday, Israeli forces struck a UN-run school in Nuseirat camp that was being used as a shelter for displaced people but which the military said “served as a hideout” for militants.

The civil defence agency in Gaza said 15 people were killed in the strike, the fifth attack in just over a week to hit a school used as shelter by displaced Palestinians.

Faced with sharp criticism from allies and opposition alike, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on October 29 apologized for an earlier statement in which he blamed the security services for failing to prevent the Hamas attack on October 7.

“I was wrong. The things I said following the press conference should not have been said and I apologize for that,” Mr. Netanyahu said in a post on X, shortly after deleting his original statement on the same social media platform.

“I give full backing to all the heads of the security services. I am sending strength to the [IDF] chief of staff and the commanders and soldiers of the IDF who are on the frontlines and fighting for our home,” the Israeli prime minister further said.

Late Saturday night, Mr. Netanyahu in a post on X said that he never received any warnings of Hamas’ “war intentions” at any stage, and stressed that “all the security services, including the head of military intelligence and the head of the Shin Bet, were of the opinion that Hamas was deterred and wanted to come to a settlement”.

His comments evoked sharp criticism following which it was deleted.

Also read | Israel-Hamas war, Day 23 LIVE updates

At a press conference on Saturday evening, reporters repeatedly asked the Israeli prime minister if he accepted responsibility for the failure, a question he evaded saying that there would be a thorough enquiry about it after the War and everyone would have to give answers, “including me”.

Several security chiefs have accepted responsibility for the massive failure, but Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister who has been at the helm of affairs since 2009 except for a brief 13-month gap, has desisted from taking any blame for it.

The spokesman for the Israeli Army, Daniel Hagari, tried to brush aside the controversy, saying “I will not answer that question. We are now in a war and are focused on it”.

“We in the IDF and Shin Bet will conduct a thorough investigation of the truth and present everything to the public,” Hagari was quoted as saying in the local media.

“Now we are fighting and focused on the war,” he emphasised.

Netanyahu’s ally National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir criticised the Prime Minister for the post but said that this was not the proper time “for an accounting”.

“The problem isn’t specific warnings, but rather the entire mistaken concept. The policy of containment, the imaginary deterrence, and buying temporary quiet for an exorbitant price” are the root of the entire problem, Ben Gvir said in a post on X, referring to Netanyahu’s post.

Ben Gvir, the leader of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, however, said that such a discussion “is not for now,” but that there will be “a lot of time afterwards for an accounting”.

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid said that the prime minister has “crossed a red line” by blaming the security and defence services.

“While IDF soldiers and commanders are fighting valiantly against Hamas and Hezbollah, he is trying to blame them instead of backing them up,” Mr. Lapid wrote on X.

“Such attempts to evade responsibility and place the blame on the security establishment weakens the IDF while it is fighting Israel’s enemies,” he said, demanding, “Netanyahu must apologize for his words”.

National Unity chairman and former Defence Minister Benny Gantz, who joined Netanyahu’s government to boost war preparation efforts, called on the Prime Minister to retract his comments.

“This morning in particular I want to back and support all the security forces and IDF soldiers, including the IDF chief of staff, the head of military intelligence, the head of the Shin Bet,” Mr. Gantz said.

“When we are at war, leadership needs to be responsible, to decide to do the right things and support the [security] forces in a way in which they can carry out what we demand of them. Any other action or comment harms the resilience of the people and its forces,” he asserted.

“The Prime Minister must retract his comments from yesterday and stop dealing with this issue,” Mr. Gantz stressed.

Meanwhile, the IDF intensified attacks on Hamas bases in Gaza, saying that it struck some 450 targets belonging to the organisation over the past day.

The targets included Hamas command centres, observation posts, and anti-tank guided missile launch positions, the IDF said.

The Israeli army also expanded ground operations in the Gaza Strip overnight, reinforcing with additional troops.

More than 1400 Israelis were killed and around 230 were taken hostage when Hamas carried out a dastardly attack infiltrating several communities in the south of Israel.

The health ministry in Gaza run by Hamas has claimed that more than 8,000 people have been killed in the coastal Strip since Israel launched a retaliatory campaign to eliminate the militant group.