Gaza [Palestine], November 2: The Israeli military has attacked the Gaza Strip for a fifth day, killing at least five people in another test of the fragile US-brokered ceasefire.
Five people have been killed and 17 bodies recovered over the past 24 hours, Gaza's Health Ministry said in a statement. The overall death toll from Israel's two-year war on the Strip has risen to 68,858 with 170,664 wounded, the ministry said.
"A number of victims remain under the rubble and in the streets as ambulance and civil defence teams have been unable to reach them so far," it said. Since the ceasefire started on October 11, at least 226 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza, with 594 wounded and 499 bodies recovered from the vast debris.
Gaza residents said they fear a return to Israel's full-scale bombing as they struggle to find food, water, and medicine during the US-brokered truce. Local residents told Al Jazeera that Israeli forces continue the demolition of residential buildings in the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza and northern Gaza City, as quadcopter drones were seen dropping grenades.
Father-of-five Hisham Al Bardai, who recently returned to his home in north Gaza's Jabalia camp, said, "The truce has begun, but the war hasn't ended and [the] policy of starvation continues," he said, referring to Israel's strict blockade on the entry of supplies into Gaza, which it eased slightly after the ceasefire went into effect.
Meanwhile, aid agencies are accusing Israel of thwarting the delivery of desperately needed humanitarian relief into Gaza by refusing accreditation for NGO staff, a news report said.
A new registration system imposed by Israel on international aid groups has resulted in $50mn of aid being stuck outside of the Strip, The Financial Times reported.
The Israeli restrictions are "about control and by design it's pushing out both international and Palestinian-led organisations", Bushra Khalidi from Oxfam told the newspaper.
Source: Qatar Tribune
