Israel kills 71 people in Gaza, hours after announcing agreement with Islamist group Hamas

The Israeli Army killed at least 71 Gazans between the night and early morning of this Thursday, according to the Civil Defense, most of them in Gaza City, in the hours that followed the announcement last night of a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel that must come into effect on Sunday.

“Since the ceasefire agreement was announced in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli occupation forces have killed 71 martyrs. In Gaza City alone Gaza There are 61 martyrs, (including) more than 19 children and 24 women, in addition to about 200 wounded,” a spokesman for the Gazan Civil Defense, in charge of recovering bodies and victims after the attacks, detailed today.

At least 18 Gazans were killed and others wounded in the bombing of residential blocks in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, west of Gaza City, according to this source, while another 20 were killed in another attack near the Engineers Union, also in the Gazan capital.

(Read also: Israel-Hamas Agreement: since when does the truce apply and what is the first phase of the ceasefire? )

In addition, five other people died in the attack on another house in the Al Daraj neighborhood, east of the capital, Wafa confirmed. Two other girls died in the attack on houses in the Shujaiya neighborhood, according to medical sources.

“A terrifying night” in Gaza due to Israeli bombings

Also in City of Gazarescue teams recovered 5 dead and more than 10 injured from beneath the rubble of a bombed house in the Al Rimal neighborhood.

“A terrifying night throughout the Gaza Strip! The pace of bombing has increased drastically in the last few hours, and with it the number of martyrs and wounded,” journalist Anas al Sharif, who works for Al Jazeera in Gaza.

Airstrikes have also occurred in central areas such as the Nuseirat camp and against homes in southern Khan Yunis, where at least two other people have been killed in the Qizan Rashwan area.

Qatar announced last night in Doha that Israel and Hamas had finally reached a ceasefire, but since dawn Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has blamed Hamas for wanting to go back on some of the details already agreed and has postponed today’s government meeting in which Israel was to give green light to ceasefire.

More than 46,700 Palestinians have been killed and around twice as many wounded in the Strip by Israeli attacks in 15 months of devastating war, although that estimate would be very conservative by some estimates.

(Read also: Israel says issues remain “unresolved” over Gaza truce with Hamas)

The ceasefire agreement contemplates a first phase of six weeks in which 33 Israeli hostages – with priority given to children, women and the elderly – will be released in exchange for the release of more than 1,200 Palestinian prisoners.

There are 94 captives left inside the Strip, 34 of them confirmed dead, but the real number could be higher. To date, the parties had only reached a truce agreement, the last week of November 2023, when 105 hostages were released in exchange for 240 prisoners, with preference in both cases for women and children.