RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Desperate Palestinians fleeing Israel’s expanding ground offensive crowded into an ever-shrinking area of the Gaza Strip as the Israel-Hamas war entered its third month Friday. The United Nations warned that its aid operation is “in tatters” because no place in the besieged enclave is safe.
The Israeli army said that over the past day its forces had struck about 450 targets in the tiny, densely populated Gaza Strip, signaling the continued intensity of a campaign that has already led to widespread civilian casualties and mass displacements.
Israel also dropped leaflets over parts of Gaza with a biblical warning to Hamas leaders that it would take “a life for a life, an eye for an eye.” A day after troops rounded up hundreds of Palestinians for questioning about suspected ties to Hamas, an Israeli government spokesman suggested that practice would continue.
The first images of such roundups emerged Thursday from the northern town of Beit Lahiya, showing dozens of men kneeling or sitting in the streets, stripped down to their underwear, their hands bound behind their backs and some with their heads bowed.
Israel has vowed to crush the military capabilities of Hamas, which rules Gaza, and remove it from power following the group’s Oct. 7 attack that sparked the war.
Israel’s air and ground campaign initially focused on the northern half of Gaza, leading hundreds of thousands of…
