Gaza War | Israel renews call for refugees to flee

There have been further deadly Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip: At least 34 people have been killed since Wednesday morning, including 26 in Gaza City, the Palestinian news agency Wafa reported. The Israeli army remains determined to capture Gaza City and has renewed its evacuation order to the population. It has also sent voice and text messages and dropped leaflets urging people to leave the city. "Staying in this area is very dangerous," the message stated, among other things. Israel's military wants a clear path to destroy the last remaining Hamas cells.

According to eyewitnesses, thousands of families left the city, some on foot, heading southwest of the Gaza Strip. There, in Al-Mawasi, Israel had designated a supposed "humanitarian zone," which the military has repeatedly attacked. "There is no safe place in the Gaza Strip, neither in the north nor in the south," Amjad Shawa of the Palestinian NGO Network said at a press conference on Wednesday. The international community has failed to protect the civilian population.

Mohammad Al-Attar, 42, is one of the refugees. He told the German Press Agency that he could not expose his five children to the danger of the Israeli offensive. "I have no choice anymore." He was pulling blankets and clothing on a small cart on his way south. While he considered the escape dangerous, the Palestinian explained, it was better to flee than risk losing his children.

However, many are too weak due to the famine prevailing in Gaza to even attempt the journey, reports Mahmoud Al-Saqqa of Oxfam in the Gaza Strip. Salma Al-Tawil, who works for the Norwegian Refugee Council in the Gaza Strip, estimates that only around ten percent of residents have left the city so far. Moreover, many families don't even have the money to organize a move.

This is how Amina Abu Jimisa wants to stay. "The south is being bombed just like the north," the woman is certain. That's why she wants to stay with her children in their house in the Rimal district, even if they are killed. "Here are the memories of my children," said the 36-year-old. Her husband built the family home. "If I have to give up all this, who am I?"

Following the Israeli Air Force attack on the Hamas leadership in Qatar's capital, Doha, an agreement for a ceasefire is no longer expected. Citing diplomats, the Times of Israel reported that Qatar will now suspend its role as mediator . UN Secretary-General António Guterres had already sharply criticized the Israeli attack. "I condemn this blatant violation of Qatar's sovereignty and territorial integrity," Guterres said in New York on Tuesday.