Four Israeli soldiers killed in southern Gaza

The military said four Israeli soldiers were killed Friday in southern Gaza when an explosive detonated as they searched a Hamas compound in Khan Younis, causing part of a building to collapse. Five soldiers were injured, one seriously, spokesperson Effie Defrin said.

The war broke out on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led terrorists launched a surprise attack on Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted 251 hostages. They are still holding 56 hostages, around a third of them believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.

Israeli forces have rescued eight living hostages from Gaza and recovered dozens of bodies.

Since then, Israel has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians in its military campaign, according to the Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its figures.

In northern Gaza on Friday, Israel issued a new warning to civilians saying the military was about to undertake intensive operations in an area after it said rockets were fired toward Israel from the sector.

In the southern city of Rafah, nine people were killed on their way to try and collect humanitarian aid at various distribution points, according to officials at Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis. Eight died from gunshot wounds and the ninth person from shrapnel injuries.

Israel has accused Hamas of stealing aid and trying to block it from reaching Palestinians, and has said soldiers fired warning shots or, in some cases, shot at individuals approaching its troops.

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a newly formed group of mainly American contractors that Israel wants to use to replace humanitarian groups in Gaza that distribute aid in coordination with the U.N., told The Associated Press that reports of violence in Rafah were inaccurate and that aid distribution was completed “peacefully and without incident.”

The GHF sent out a message on its Facebook site early Friday that it had closed all aid distribution sites until further notice and urged people to stay away for their own safety.

It later clarified that the measure was only a temporary pause due to excessive crowding and that the agency had distributed all aid available Friday.

Israel’s military said that going ahead, distribution sites would be operated from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily and that outside those hours, the areas would be considered closed military zones that are strictly off limits.

A leading U.S. management-consulting firm, the Boston Consulting Group, said Friday it had let go of two of the firm’s partners over what it said was their unauthorized work for the GHF’s food distribution in Gaza.

In a statement, the firm said the two partners failed to adequately disclose the nature of the work on the effort. The partners, whom the statement did not identify, “have been exited from the firm,” the consulting group said. It said the firm’s investigation of the matter was ongoing.

Elsewhere, the Lebanese army condemned Friday Israel’s airstrikes on suburbs of Beirut, warning that such attacks are weakening the role of Lebanon’s armed forces that might eventually suspend cooperation with the committee monitoring the truce that ended the Israel-Hezbollah war.

The army statement came hours after the Israeli military struck several buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs that it said held underground facilities used by Hezbollah for drone production. The strikes, preceded by an Israeli warning to evacuate several buildings, came on the eve of Eid al-Adha, a Muslim holiday.