Israeli strikes kill 33 in Gaza

Gaza's civil defence agency reported that Israeli air strikes on Thursday killed at least 33 people, including 12 guards securing aid trucks in southern parts of the Palestinian territory.

The latest bloodshed came just hours after the UN General Assembly called for an immediate ceasefire in the devastated territory.

Seven guards were killed in a strike in Rafah, while another attack left five guards dead in Khan Yunis, agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.


"The occupation once again targeted those securing the aid trucks," Bassal told AFP, adding that around 30 people, most of them children, were also wounded in the strikes.

"The trucks carrying flour were on their way to UNRWA warehouses," Bassal noted, referring to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees.

"The occupation aims to destroy all services for citizens across the Gaza Strip."

Witnesses later told AFP that residents looted flour from the trucks after the strikes.

The Israeli military said its forces "conducted precise strikes" overnight on armed Hamas militants present in the humanitarian corridor in southern Gaza.

"All of the terrorists that were eliminated were members of Hamas and planned to violently hijack humanitarian aid trucks and transfer them to Hamas in support of continuing terrorist activity, preventing them from reaching Gazan civilians, as was done in previous cases," the military alleged in a statement.

It insisted it "does not strike humanitarian aid trucks and the humanitarian corridor remains open and active".