Israel’s military has launched dozens of strikes on targets across the Gaza Strip, shattering a ceasefire with Hamas.
Health officials in the Hamas-run strip said more than 400 Palestinians have been killed in the strikes, which hit densely populated areas. In Rafah, in southern Gaza, 17 members of a single family were killed, including women and children.
The Israeli military said in a statement: “This preemptive offensive will continue as long as necessary, and will expand beyond air strikes.”
Here’s what we know about the strikes, and what could happen next.
The war in Gaza was triggered by an attack by Hamas on 7 October 2023, during which around 1,200 people were killed and 251 people were taken captive.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the strikes were ordered after Hamas’s “repeated refusal to release our hostages”.
The strikes came two months after a ceasefire deal was brokered to temporarily halt the conflict, with Israel’s retaliatory offensive inside Gaza having killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza’s health ministry, and laid waste to the territory home to 2.3 million people, who face severe shortages of medicine, fuel and food.
“Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength,” Mr Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. Hamas still holds 59 hostages.
The Israeli military said it launched a series of “preemptive strikes targeting mid-ranking military commanders, leadership officials and terrorist infrastructure belonging to the Hamas terrorist organisation”.
In a statement issued shortly after strikes began, Israel Katz, Israel’s defence minister, said “the gates of hell will open in Gaza” and that Hamas would be hit with a force it has “never seen before” if it did not release all remaining hostages it holds.
Casualties included senior Hamas officials, including political leaders and ministers, as well as many women and children, according to medics and Palestinian officials in Gaza.
The Israeli military said it was prepared to spread out in “all areas”, including through increased personnel at borders and the Aerial Defence Array.
In the wake of the new strikes, Hamas accused Israel of breaching the ceasefire and jeopardising efforts by mediators to secure a permanent truce.
The ceasefire agreement involved a three-phase plan. Under the first, six-week phase, Hamas returned 25 living hostages and the bodies of eight others, in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails. Israeli troops also withdrew from some buffer zones in Gasa allowing displaced Palestinians to return home to northern Gaza.
