Evacuation Orders
Palestinian families walk past destroyed buildings and rubble after the Israeli military withdrew from the Shejaiya neighborhood east of Gaza City on July 10.Omar al-Qattaa/AFP via Getty Images
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) ordered all residents of Gaza City on Wednesday to immediately evacuate the “dangerous combat zone.” Dropped leaflets instructed Palestinians to head south via two designated safe routes, marked as roads leading to shelters in Deir al-Balah and al-Zawaida in central Gaza, as Israel intensifies its combat operations in the north. The IDF claims that Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have regrouped in Gaza City since the start of 2024.
This is the first time since last October that all residents of Gaza’s largest city have been ordered to evacuate the area, where more than a quarter of a million people are currently living. Locals report that Israeli strikes began targeting the city before dawn on Monday and have continued with little reprieve, similar to how the IDF began its operation three months ago to retake Al-Shifa Hospital from Hamas militants.
The United Nations Human Rights Office has condemned the ongoing strikes. The U.N. is “appalled” by the IDF ordering Palestinians to flee to “areas where Israeli military operations are ongoing and where civilians continue to be killed and injured,” the agency said on Tuesday. The press release follows an Israeli missile hitting a school in southern Gaza where displaced Palestinians were watching a soccer game. At least 31 people were killed in Tuesday’s strike, and more than 50 others were injured. The IDF said it used a “precision munition” there to target a militant who had taken part in Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
Additional Israeli bombardments on Wednesday struck four houses in Deir al-Balah and the nearby Nuseirat refugee camp, killing at least 20 people. One of the homes hit was located in the “humanitarian safe zone” where Israel told Palestinians on Wednesday to flee to. “Civilians, especially children, must not get caught in the crossfire,” the German Foreign Ministry posted on X on Wednesday. “The repeated attacks on schools by the Israeli army must stop and an investigation must come quickly.”
The U.N. also warned of overcrowding in Deir al-Balah as well as limited humanitarian access across Gaza. The Palestinian Red Crescent announced on Tuesday that it will close all of its stations and clinics in Gaza City due to ongoing IDF operations there. Only 13 of the enclave’s 36 hospitals are functioning—and only partially.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told the Knesset on Wednesday that Israeli forces have killed or wounded 60 percent of all Hamas fighters since the war began last October. In the past nine months, more than 38,200 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza. Cease-fire talks resumed in Doha, Qatar, this week between Egyptian, U.S., and Israeli intelligence chiefs. But Hamas said that Israel’s renewed assault on Gaza City could “reset the negotiation process to square one.”