Israeli strikes killed at least 36 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip yesterday, including a pregnant woman and her newborn, local health officials said.
The newborn died hours after being delivered in a complex surgery. She had been placed in an incubator and was breathing with assistance from a ventilator.
Her mother, Soad Al Shaer, who was seven months pregnant with her, was among 12 Palestinians killed in an Israeli air strike on a house and neighbouring tents in the Muwasi area of Khan Younis, according to Nasser Hospital, which received the bodies.
Another strike hit a two-storey house in Khan Younis, killing at least 11 people, more than half of them women and children, according to the hospital. At least five others were killed in strikes elsewhere in Gaza, according to other hospitals.
COGAT, the Israeli military body in charge of co-ordinating aid shipments, said UN agencies collected 120 trucks for distribution on Sunday and that another 180 trucks had been allowed into Gaza.
The UN and aid groups say the territory needs 500-600 trucks a day to meet its needs. Israel’s blockade and military operations have destroyed nearly all food production in the territory of roughly 2 million Palestinians.
Two air force planes from Jordan and the UAE meanwhile airdropped 17 tonnes of humanitarian aid in Gaza yesterday.
The head of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, Philippe Lazzarini, warned that airdrops are “expensive, inefficient and can even kill starving civilians” and won’t reverse the increasing starvation.
The 17 tonnes of aid would fill less than one aid truck, according to World Food Programme’s calculations of almost 19 tons per aid truck.
The Awda Hospital in central Gaza said it received the bodies of seven Palestinians who it said were killed yesterday by Israeli fire close to an aid distribution site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an Israeli-backed American contractor.
The hospital said 20 others were wounded close to the site.
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