At least 30 Palestinians, including women and children, killed by Israeli strikes Gazahospital officials said, marking one of the highest death tolls in a ceasefire started in October.
The strikes, which came a day after Israel accused Hamas of further ceasefire violations, hit several locations across Gaza, including an apartment building in Gaza City and a tent camp in Khan Younis, officials at the hospitals that received the bodies told The Associated Press. An airstrike also hit a police station in Gaza City, killing at least 14 people and injuring others, Shifa Hospital director Mahamed Abu Selmiya said.
Abed Rahim Khatib/alliance photo via Getty Images 
The Israeli military said in a statement that the strikes were a response to what it considers a violation of the ceasefire agreement by Hamas after the army killed at least four terrorists emerging from a tunnel in an Israeli-controlled area of Rafah.
“Terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip systematically violate international law, brutally exploiting civilian infrastructure and the Gazan population as human shields for terrorist activities,” the Israeli military said, adding that it would continue to act against any violation of the ceasefire agreement.
Nasser Hospital said the attack on the tent camp caused a fire, killing seven people, including a father, his three children and three grandchildren. Separately, Shifa Hospital said the attack on an apartment building in Gaza City killed three children, their aunt and grandmother on Saturday morning, while the attack on the police station killed at least 14 police officers, including four female police officers, civilians and detainees held at the station. The hospital also said a man was killed in a strike Saturday in the eastern part of the Jabaliya refugee camp.
Omar AL-QATTAA /AFP via Getty Images 
Hamas called Saturday’s strikes “another blatant violation” and urged the United States and other mediating countries to push Israel to stop the strikes.
Saturday’s strikes are a reminder that the death toll in Gaza continues to rise even as the ceasefire agreement progresses.
The Israeli army, which struck targets on on both sides of the ceasefire dividing linesaid its attacks since October were in response to violations of the agreement.
The number of deaths reported on Saturday was several times higher than the daily average since the ceasefire began. As of Friday, the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry had recorded at least 520 Palestinians killed by Israeli fire since the ceasefire began on October 10. The ministry maintains detailed casualty records that are generally considered reliable by UN agencies and independent experts.
Saturday’s strikes also came a day before the opening of the Rafah crossing along the border with Egypt in Gaza’s southernmost city. All of the territory’s border crossings were closed for most of the war. Palestinians view Rafah as a lifeline for the tens of thousands of people needing care outside the territory, where the majority of medical infrastructure has been destroyed.
The opening of the terminal, limited at first, marks the first major step in the second phase of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire. Reopening the borders is among the difficult issues on the agenda of the current phase, which also includes the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip after nearly two decades of Hamas rule and the installation of a new government to oversee reconstruction.
