Twenty-one minors, including five who have cancer, were due to travel through the Kerem Shalom crossing into Israel on Thursday, according to Palestinian officials and the World Health Organization .
Egypt has refused to reopen the Rafah border crossing, the only way out of the territory for fleeing civilians and the major channel for aid, since Israel forces captured it at the start of their ground operation in the area last month. Cairo officials have maintained that the crossing – since the war broke out, the sole one for civilians leaving the territory – must be returned to Palestinian control.
Fierce fighting and airstrikes continued in central Rafah and restarted in the Gaza City neighbourhood of Shejaiya on Thursday, residents reported. According to medics and the civil defence agency in the Hamas-run territory, Israeli strikes overnight and early Thursday killed at least five people in Gaza City and another in Beit Lahia, also in the north. The Israeli military said it had “attacked terrorists who were in a school complex in Khan Younis” in the south.
Anti-government demonstrators held a day of protests across Israel on Thursday, blocking motorways and gathering outside politicians’ homes to demand a hostage deal and new elections.