Gaza aid surges amid 8,000+ deaths, Israel escalates military action

Nearly three dozen trucks entered Gaza on Sunday in the largest aid convoy since the war between Israel and Hamas began, but humanitarian workers said the assistance still fell desperately short of needs after thousands of people broke into warehouses to take flour and basic hygiene products.
The Gaza Health Ministry said the death toll among Palestinians passed 8,000, mostly women and minors, as Israeli tanks and infantry pursued what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called a “second stage” in the war ignited by Hamas’ brutal Oct 7 incursion. The toll is without precedent in decades of Israeli-Palestinian violence. Over 1,400 people have died on the Israeli side, mainly civilians killed during the initial attack.
Communications were restored to much of Gaza early Sunday after an Israeli bombardment described by residents as the most intense of the war knocked out most contact late Friday. The besieged enclave’s 2.3 million people were largely cut off from the world.
Israel has allowed only a small trickle of aid to enter. On Sunday, 33 trucks of aid entered the only border crossing from Egypt, a spokesperson at the Rafah crossing, Wael Abo Omar, told The Associated Press. After visiting the Rafah crossing, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court called the suffering of civilians “profound’’ and said he had not been able to enter Gaza.
The court investigates and prosecutes people for war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. It has been investigating the actions of Israeli and Palestinian authorities since 2014. The Israeli military said Sunday it had struck over 450 militant targets over the past 24 hours, including Hamas command centres and anti-tank missile launching positions. It said ground forces killed a number of Hamas militants as they exited one of their extensive network of Gaza tunnels near the Erez crossing, which was the sole pedestrian passageway into Israel before it was destroyed in the fighting.
The Hamas military wing said its militants clashed with Israeli troops who entered the northwest Gaza Strip with small arms and anti-tank missiles. Palestinian militants have continued firing rockets into Israel. The aid warehouse break-ins were “a worrying sign that civil order is starting to break down after three weeks of war and a tight siege on Gaza,’’ said Thomas White, Gaza director for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA. ‘’People are scared, frustrated and desperate”.
One warehouse held 80 tons of food, the UN World Food Program said. It emphasised that at least 40 of its trucks need to cross into Gaza daily just to meet growing food needs.
Israeli authorities said Sunday that they would soon allow more humanitarian aid to enter Gaza.