Israel: 170 terrorists killed in hospital raid

RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Israel’s military says it has killed more than 170 Hamas terrorists and detained about 480 suspects in the raid on Shifa Hospital that began March 18, calling it a blow to Hamas and other armed groups it says had regrouped there as the war nears the six-month mark.

The fighting highlights the resilience of Palestinian armed groups in a heavily destroyed part of Gaza where Israeli troops have been forced to return after a similar raid in the war’s earliest weeks.

Israeli jets on Sunday launched several strikes near Shifa Hospital, which largely stopped functioning following the November raid. After claiming that Hamas maintained an elaborate command center there, Israeli forces months ago exposed a single tunnel leading to a few underground rooms.

Hardly any aid has been delivered in recent weeks to northern Gaza and Gaza City, where Shifa is located. The isolated area suffered widespread devastation in the early days of Israel’s offensive launched after the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack that triggered the war.

Israel’s military said Saturday it had evacuated patients and medical staff from Shifa’s emergency department because terrorists entrenched themselves there, and set up an alternative site for seriously wounded patients.

Israel’s military early Sunday also stormed al-Amal and Nasser hospitals in the southern city of Khan Younis amid “very intense shelling,” the Palestinian Red Crescent Society said. Israel’s military announced operations in Khan Younis targeting Hamas infrastructure but said troops weren’t currently operating in the hospitals. It accused Hamas of using hospitals as shields.

The war has killed at least 32,226 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants in its toll.

Among the latest killed were at least seven people, including three children, when an Israeli airstrike hit a house in Rafah overnight, according to health authorities. And an airstrike near Deir al-Balah late Sunday killed at least 10 members of a family including two children, according to an AP journalist who saw the bodies at a hospital.

Israel says it has killed more than 13,000 terrorists. It blames civilian casualties on Hamas, accusing it of embedding in residential areas.

More than 80 percent of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have fled their homes, with most seeking refuge in the southernmost city of Rafah, which Israel calls the next target of its ground offensive. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejects pleas from the United States and others to avoid a major ground operation there, calling it essential for defeating Hamas.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that he was traveling to the U.S. on Sunday at Washington’s invitation, with a goal of preserving “our ability to obtain air systems and munitions” for the war and maintaining critical ties with Israel’s top ally.

The Hamas-led Oct. 7 terrorist attack across southern Israel killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took scores hostage. Hamas still holds an estimated 100 hostages and the remains of 30 others. Most of the rest were freed in exchange for the release of some Palestinian prisoners in November.

The United States, Qatar and Egypt are trying to broker another cease-fire and release.

Over the border from Gaza on Sunday, Jews celebrated Purim, the biblical story of how a plot to exterminate Jews in Persia was thwarted as an affirmation of Jewish survival.