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Thousands on the move after Israel ordered evacuations, UN humanitarian office says; IDF says it intercepted two targets above the city of Haifa
This is the Guardian’s live coverage of the Israeli-Hamas war. I’m Rebecca Ratcliffe and I will be bringing you the latest developments as they happen.
The UN humanitarian office has estimated that tens of thousands of people in Gaza have now fled their homes and moved south after Israel issued an evacuation warning ahead of a feared ground invasion. Israel’s military told about 1.1 million people in northern Gaza to leave the area, and, according to the UN, set a 24 hour deadline for this evacuation early on Friday.
The Israeli military says it struck a Hezbollah target in southern Lebanon in response to the “infiltration of unidentified aerial objects into Israel” and fire on an Israeli drone. The military intercepted the objects and the fire on its drone, it said.
Israeli troops carried out local raids on in the Gaza Strip, searching for hostages and collecting evidence to find people taken by Hamas, the Israel Defence Forces said on Friday. Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to “eradicate” Hamas and said Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza “is just the beginning”, in televised remarks.
The UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, warned that the situation in Gaza has reached “a dangerous new low”, and called for immediate humanitarian access to allow fuel, food and water to reach those in need. “Even wars have rules,” Guterres told reporters on Friday. The UN Security Council discussed the crisis at a meeting behind closed doors on Friday.
At least 1,900 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza from Israeli strikes, including 614 children and 370 women, according to Gaza’s health ministry on Friday. At least 16 Palestinians were shot and killed in the West Bank over the course of the day, the Palestinian health ministry said.
Israeli airstrikes on convoys fleeing Gaza City killed 70 people, mostly women and children, the press office of Hamas said. Hamas said the cars were struck in three places as they headed south from Gaza City on Friday.
The US president, Joe Biden, said he had spoken with the families of Americans held by Hamas in Gaza, and that they were “going through agony” not knowing the fate of their loved ones. He told CBS: “We’re going to do everything in our power to find them... we’re working like hell on it.”
Tens of thousands of protesters have rallied across the Middle East and in parts of Asia, Europe and the US in support of Palestinians and condemnation of Israel as it intensified its strikes on Gaza in retaliation for Hamas attacks a week ago.
Jewish communities in the US, France and other countries also held rallies on Friday in solidarity with Israel after the Hamas attack. Some governments have stepped up security at synagogues and Jewish schools, fearing that protests could lead to violence.
A journalist has been killed and six others injured after an Israeli shell landed in a gathering of international journalists covering clashes on the border in south Lebanon on Friday. Reuters confirmed that its videographer Issam Abdallah was killed. Meanwhile, the BBC said its journalists were assaulted and held at gunpoint after they were stopped by Israeli police in Tel Aviv.
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