Israeli strikes kill at least eight in Gaza City

Israeli airstrikes have killed at least eight people in Gaza City and the nearby Al-Shati refugee camp, according to Gaza civil defence officials. The strikes hit at dawn, with seven of the dead reported in residential buildings and one in the camp to the west of the city. Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City said 15 people were wounded in the attacks.

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Civil defence spokesman Mahmoud Bassal said the deaths were caused by Israeli airstrikes on Gaza City. The figures were given on Thursday morning, and no independent casualty assessment was included in the supplied material. The latest strikes were reported as violence continued despite a truce that has technically been in effect since October.

The reported deaths add to a conflict that has continued to produce casualties even after the ceasefire began. Gaza's health ministry, which operates under Hamas authority, has said Israel has killed at least 936 people since the truce started, and its figures are considered reliable by the UN. Both Hamas and Israel accuse each other of violating the ceasefire, while implementation of the next phase has been stalled for months.

The truce was meant to move beyond the initial exchange of hostages and detainees. Under the first phase, the last Israeli hostages held by Hamas were released in exchange for Palestinians detained by Israel. The second phase was supposed to involve Hamas's disarmament and a gradual withdrawal of the Israeli army, but that process has not advanced.

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The continued strikes underline how fragile the arrangement remains and how far the parties are from a durable settlement. The supplied material also points to a wider pattern of military pressure in Gaza. Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the military to take control of 70% of Gaza.

In the same period, the latest head of Hamas's armed wing in Gaza, Mohammed Odeh, was killed in an Israeli strike, a month after his predecessor was also killed. These developments suggest the conflict remains active even as ceasefire terms remain formally in place. What remains unclear from the latest reports is the identity of those killed in the dawn strikes and whether there were any military targets in the areas hit.

It is also not clear whether the latest attacks will affect stalled talks on the next phase of the truce. The immediate focus will be on any further casualty updates from hospitals and civil defence officials, and on whether either side claims the strikes were a response to earlier violations.

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