Sept 18,2025: The Palestinian health ministry has said that at least 79 people have been killed in Gaza in the last 24 hours and 228 people have been in injured.
The health ministry added that a number of people remain trapped under the rubble of buildings which collapsed.
Hospitals in besieged Gaza City are on the “brink of collapse”, the World Health Organization (WHO) chief says, as Israel’s widely denounced ground invasion enters its third day.
The assault is “driving new waves of displacement, forcing traumatised families into an ever-shrinking area unfit for human dignity”, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
“The injured and people with disabilities cannot move to safety, which puts their lives in grave danger,” he said. “We call for an immediate end to these inhumane conditions. We call for a ceasefire.”
Israel’s military assault on Gaza City has forced hundreds of thousands of desperate Palestinians south and the humanitarian disaster is increasing in intensity, the UN says.
The Israeli military said it was opening an additional route for 48 hours that Palestinians could use to leave Gaza City as it stepped up efforts on Wednesday to empty the city of civilians and confront thousands of Hamas combatants.
Hundreds of thousands of people are sheltering in the city and many are reluctant to follow Israel’s orders to move south because of dangers along the way, dire conditions, a lack of food in the southern area and fear of permanent displacement.
At least 63 people were killed by Israeli strikes and gunfire across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, with most of the casualties in Gaza City, local health authorities said.
They said the latest fatalities took the Palestinian death toll from the two-year war between Israel and Hamas past 65,000. Palestinian officials and rescue workers say the true figure is likely higher as many remains are trapped under the rubble of destroyed buildings.
The war was triggered by the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel estimates about 400,000 people, or 40% of those who were in Gaza City on August 10 – when it announced plans to take control – have already fled. The Gaza media office says 190,000 have headed south and 350,000 have moved to central and western areas of the city.
A day after Israel announced the launch of its ground offensive to seize control of Gaza’s main urban centre, tanks had moved short distances towards the city’s central and western areas from three directions, but no major advance was reported.
An Israeli official said military operations were focused on getting civilians to head south and that fighting would intensify over the next month or two.
The official said Israel expected around 100,000 civilians to remain in the city, which would take months to capture, and said the operation could be suspended if a ceasefire was reached with the Hamas militant group.
The prospects of a ceasefire appear remote after Israel attacked Hamas political leaders in Doha last week, infuriating Qatar, a co-mediator in ceasefire talks.
Defying global criticism of the attack, including a rebuke by Israel’s stalwart ally, the United States, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel would strike Hamas leaders anywhere.
