People check buildings destroyed in an Israeli strike on the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip yesterday. (AFP)
Geneva/Gaza: A group of UN human rights experts, including the special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, said yesterday that "time is running out to prevent genocide and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza".
"We remain convinced that the Palestinian people are at grave risk of genocide," the experts said in a joint statement. "The time for action is now. Israel's allies also bear responsibility and must act now to prevent its disastrous course of action."
The health ministry in Gaza said yesterday at least 27 people were killed in an Israeli strike near a UN school in the Jabalia refugee camp.
"The bodies of 27 martyrs were recovered and a large number of wounded," said ministry spokesman Ashraf Al Qudra. AFP footage from the incident showed several casualties as crowds of people rushed to rescue the injured.
Before the strike, the ministry said the death toll in Israeli bombardment in Gaza had surpassed 9,000.
The ministry said 9,061 had been killed since the war began on October 7. Of these, 3,760 were children and an additional 32,000 had been wounded, the ministry said.
Hundreds more foreigners and dual nationals fled Gaza for Egypt yesterday as Israeli forces bombarded and fought ground battles in the besieged Palestinian territory.
Egypt said it eventually plans to help evacuate 7,000 foreigners through the Rafah crossing and a spokesman for the Palestinian side of the border post said about 100 had been able to leave yesterday.
A total of 400 foreign passport holders as well as 60 severely wounded Palestinians in ambulances were due to cross by the end of the second day of departures, Wael Abu Mohsen said, and Egyptian officials later reported the first arrivals. A list of those approved to travel yesterday shows hundreds of US citizens and 50 Belgians along with smaller numbers from various European, Arab, Asian and African countries.
The evacuation marks a tiny proportion of the 2.4 million people trapped in Gaza under weeks of bombardment.
Ground battles flared again overnight in northern Gaza.
Special concern has focused on repeated heavy strikes on Gaza’s largest refugee camp — densely populated Jabalia, north of Gaza City — where explosions brought down residential buildings.
Gaza’s government said 195 were killed in two days of Israeli strikes on Jabalia, with hundreds more missing and wounded.
