Israel Shells Gaza Towns, Threatens to Expand Attacks

On Friday, the cities of Gaza, Khan Yunis and Rafah continued to come under Israeli army fire amid growing fears of an offensive against the south of the Strip, where more than one million Palestinians are sheltering.

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Last night and early Friday morning, dozens of citizens were killed or injured in air and artillery bombardments on several areas of the coastal enclave, the official Wafa news agency reported.

Israeli aircraft launched numerous missiles at the neighborhoods of Al-Rimal, Al-Sabra, Al-Zaytoun, Tal Al-Hawa and Sheikh Ajlin in the northern Gaza Strip, resulting in fatalities and injuries, it added.

Meanwhile, gunships fired shells at the fishermen's port area, west of the town.

Wafa announced the death of four people when a kindergarten housing displaced persons in the town of Al-Zawaida was hit.

Several people were also killed in air strikes on houses in Deir al-Balah and in neighboring Khan Yunis, the epicenter of a ground offensive for weeks.

In the latter, a sniper killed an elderly man near the Nasser Hospital, which has been under siege since last month.

Meanwhile, eight civilians, including women and children, were killed in an attack on two homes in Rafah, the southernmost of Gaza's cities and the next target of Israeli operations.

Since Israel's announcement to expand the ground invasion into Rafah we have seen an increase in shelling, a significant intensity in scale and level of destruction, warned a Gaza correspondent for Al Jazeera television.

In the vicinity of Nasser Hospital, we witnessed a new trend of targeted assassinations, he stressed.

The journalist denounced that Israeli snipers keep the area near the health center surrounded and shoot citizens. So far, 17 bodies were recovered from the streets, he revealed.