RAFAH(National Times): Israeli forces continued to conduct air strikes on Gaza on Sunday after it expanded an evacuation order for Rafah, with the United Nations warning an outright invasion of the crowded southern city risked an \u201cepic\u201d disaster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gaza\u2019s civil defence agency said two doctors were killed on Sunday in the central town of Deir al-Balah amid heavy gunfire from Israeli helicopters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Witnesses said Israel had carried out strikes in Rafah near the crossing with Egypt on Saturday and smoke was seen rising over the city.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Israeli troops defied international opposition and entered eastern areas of the city, effectively shutting a key aid crossing and suspending traffic through another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
EU chief says Rafah civilians are being ordered to move to unsafe zones, denouncing it unacceptable<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Israel expanded an evacuation order for eastern Rafah, after 300,000 people had fled the city earlier this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t know where to go,\u201d said Farid Abu Eida, who was preparing to leave Rafah, having already been displaced there from Gaza City.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Residents piled water tanks, mattresses and other belongings onto vehicles and prepared to flee again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere is no place left in Gaza that is safe or not overcrowded\u2026 There\u2019s nowhere we can go.\u201d Residents were told to go to the \u201chumanitarian zone\u201d of Al-Mawasi, on the coast northwest of Rafah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
International outrage mounted at Israel\u2019s operations in Rafah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
EU chief Charles Michel said on social media that Rafah civilians were being ordered to \u201cunsafe zones\u201d, denouncing it as \u201cunacceptable\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said it had started transferring 22 patients from a field hospital in Rafah, saying Israel\u2019s operations in the city were \u201cmaking it impossible to provide lifesaving medical assistance\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Israel\u2019s offensive has so far killed at least 34,971 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to Palestinian health ministry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Truce hopes fade<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n While mediation efforts towards a truce and prisoners\u2019 release appeared to stall, Hamas\u2019 armed wing said a prisoner who appeared in a video it released on Saturday had died from wounds suffered in an Israeli strike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades said Nadav Popplewell, a British-Israeli man, had been wounded in a strike a month ago and died \u201cbecause he did not receive intensive medical care because the enemy has destroyed the Gaza Strip\u2019s hospitals\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n US President Joe Biden said on Saturday a ceasefire would be achieved \u201ctomorrow\u201d if Hamas released the prisoners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An all-out Israeli offensive on Rafah would provoke \u201canarchy\u201d, US secretary of state Antony Blinken said on Sunday, while agreeing that Israeli forces had killed more civilians than Hamas fighters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIsrael\u2019s on the trajectory, potentially, to inherit an insurgency with many armed Hamas left or, if it leaves, a vacuum filled by chaos, filled by anarchy and probably refilled by Hamas,\u201d Secretary Blinken told NBC\u2019s \u201cMeet the Press.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Asked on CBS whether the US concurred with a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israeli forces had killed more civilians than Hamas fighters, Blinken simply replied, \u201cYes, we do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Donors pledge $2bn for Gaza<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n A conference of international donors in Kuwait on Sunday pledged over $2 billion to aid the devastated Gaza Strip over seven months into the war between Israel and Hamas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The conference, organised by the International Islamic Charitable Orga\u00adnisation and the UN\u2019s humanitarian coordination agency OCHA, said the funds would be dispersed over two years to support life-saving humanitarian interventions in Palestinian territory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" RAFAH(National Times): Israeli forces continued to conduct air strikes on Gaza on Sunday after it expanded an evacuation order for Rafah, with the United Nations warning an outright invasion of the crowded southern city risked an \u201cepic\u201d disaster. Gaza\u2019s civil defence agency said two doctors were killed on Sunday in the central town of Deir […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":81487,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","entry"],"yoast_head":"\n