CAIRO: Israeli forces on Wednesday killed at least 11 Palestinians in Gaza, including two 13-year-old boys who were collecting firewood, three journalists and a woman, hospitals in the war-battered enclave said.
The two boys were killed in separate incidents.
In one strike, a 13-year-old, his father and a 22-year old man were hit by Israeli drones on the eastern side of the central Bureij refugee camp, according to officials from Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central town of Deir al-Balah, which received the bodies. It wasn't immediately clear whether the men had crossed into Israeli-controlled areas.
The Israeli military said one strike came after it spotted and struck several people who were operating a drone in central Gaza that posed a threat to its troops.
The other 13-year-old was shot and killed by troops while collecting firewood in the eastern town of Bani Suheila, the Nasser hospital said, after receiving the body. In a footage circulated online, the father of Moatsem al-Sharafy is seen weeping over his body on a hospital bed.
The boy's mother, Safaa al-Sharafy, told The Associated Press that he left to gather firewood so she could cook.
"He went out in the morning, hungry," she said, tears running down her checks. "He told me he'd go quickly and come back."
A mounting death toll
Later Wednesday, an Israeli strike on the central town of Zahraa hit a vehicle carrying three Palestinian journalists who were filming a newly established displacement camp managed by an Egyptian government committee, said Mohammed Mansour, the committee's spokesman.
The bodies of two journalists were taken to the Shifa hospital in Gaza City, while the third body was taken to Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital.
Mansour said the journalists were documenting the committee's work in the newly established camp in the Netzarim area in central Gaza. He said the strike occurred about 5 kilometers (3 miles) from the Israeli-controlled area. He said the vehicle was known to the Israeli military as belonging to the Egyptian committee. Video footage circulating online showed the charred, bombed-out vehicle by the roadside, smoke still rising from the wreckage, with debris scattered about.
Nasser Hospital officials also said they received the body of a Palestinian woman shot and killed by Israeli troops in the Muwasi area of the southern city of Khan Younis, which is not controlled by the military.
In a separate attack, three brothers were killed in a tank shelling in the Bureij camp, according to Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital, where the bodies were taken.
The deaths were the latest among Palestinians in Gaza since the ceasefire that stopped the war between Hamas and Israel went into effect in October. More than 470 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire, according to the strip's health ministry.
At least 77 have been killed by Israeli gunfire near a ceasefire line that splits the territory between Israeli-held areas and most of Gaza's Palestinian population, the ministry says. The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-led government, maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as most reliable by UN agencies and independent experts.
A mother's plea
The first phase of the October ceasefire that paused two years of war between Israel and Hamas militants focused on the return of all remaining hostages in exchange for the release of hundreds of Palestinian detainees and a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces in Gaza.
The bodies of all but one hostage have been returned to Israel. Ran Gvili, a 24-year-old police officer known affectionately as Rani, was killed while fighting Hamas militants during the Oct. 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war. Gvili's body still has not been recovered.
His relatives on Wednesday called again on the government and Trump to ensure the release of his remains.
"We need to continue to amplify Rani's voice, explain about him, talk about him, and explain to the world that we, the people of Israel, will not give up on anyone," his mother, Talik Gvili, said. She told the AP the family still doesn't "really know where he is."
Hamas said Wednesday it has provided "all information" it has on Gvili's body to the ceasefire mediators, and accused Israel of obstructing search efforts in areas it controls in the Gaza Strip.
The ceasefire also allowed a surge in humanitarian aid into Gaza, mainly food. But residents say shortages of blankets and warm clothes remain, and there is little wood for fires. There's been no central electricity in Gaza since the first few days of the war in 2023, and fuel for generators is scarce.
More than 100 children have died since the start of the ceasefire — a figure that includes a 27-day-old girl who died from hypothermia over the weekend.