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On 27 October 2023, Israel launched an invasion of the Gaza Strip with the stated goals of destroying Hamas, a military and political movement that led an attack on Israel earlier in the month, and to free hostages taken by the group which is ongoing. Before the invasion, dubbed Operation Swords of Iron, Israel declared war, tightened its blockade, and ordered the evacuation of the northern Gaza Strip. More than 31,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the start of the Israeli operation, including more than 13,000 children and 9,000 women, with another 7,000 people missing and presumed dead under the rubble of destroyed buildings. By mid-December, Israel had dropped 29,000 munitions on Gaza, destroying or damaging 70 percent of homes, destroying hundreds of cultural landmarks, and damaging dozens of cemeteries. Experts say that the scale and pace of destruction in Gaza is among the most severe in recent history. A severe humanitarian crisis has developed, with healthcare in a state of collapse, shortages of food, clean water, medicine and fuel due to the blockade, electricity and communications blackouts, and the UN warning of potential famine. It was widely reported that there is "no safe place in Gaza" as Israel struck areas it had previously told Palestinians to evacuate to. The widespread civilian deaths have led to accusations of war crimes against both Israel and Hamas. Nearly all of Gaza's 2.3 million population have been internally displaced and around 250,000–500,000 Israelis were internally displaced, while thousands of Palestinians have been detained by Israel, and Israel has stated it lost 225 additional soldiers in its invasion as of 4 February 2024. As a result of the invasion, South Africa instituted proceedings against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), charging that Israel was guilty of committing a genocide, and requesting that the ICJ render provisional measures of protection. Background After Palestinian militant groups led by Hamas launched an attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 which saw a minimum of 1,139 largely non-combatant individuals killed, Israel declared war against Hamas. Israel moved to mobilize 300,000 reservists and began to move armor close to the border with the Gaza Strip in the aftermath. Included in the amassing of armor were Namer armored personnel carriers and Merkava tanks. Prior to the raids, Israel had told the UN that the more than a million people living in the north half of the Gaza Strip should evacuate within a 24-hour window. In response, Hamas instructed those residents to stay put. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had urged around 1.1 million civilians to leave North Gaza so they would not be hurt or caught in crossfire, and Israeli officials said that the window was left at 24-hours to reduce the time for Hamas to conduct military preparation in the area. However, aid groups stated that the time window was too short to evacuate the one million people, and lack of electricity in Gaza hampered the ability of electronic communications regarding the evacuation to reach Gazans. Israel had dropped leaflets in Gaza City containing the evacuation order, in addition to electronic communications. On 21 October 2023, the Israeli army dropped more leaflets in Gaza with the message: "Urgent warning! To the residents of Gaza: your presence to the North of Wadi Gaza is putting your lives at risk. Anyone who chooses not to evacuate from the North of the Gaza Strip to the South of the Gaza Strip may be identified as a partner in a terrorist organization." Raids inside Gaza On 13 October 2023, the IDF sent armored vehicles and infantry into the Gaza Strip, stating that their goals were to attack Hamas militants and to rescue hostages that had been abducted to Gaza by Hamas. The operation, according to Israeli officials, was not part of a larger and widely anticipated ground invasion, but rather a raid in which troops only temporarily enter the Gaza Strip. The IDF confirmed the same day that Israeli remains were located and retrieved in the Gaza Strip. Another raid, headed by the Givati Brigade and the 162nd Armored Division, took place between 25 and 26 October and was the largest offensive so far, including tanks, other vehicles and IDF Caterpillar D9 armored bulldozers. A follow-up raid took place the next night in the Shuja'iyya neighborhood of Gaza City. Invasion October 2023 27 October Internet and mobile phone services in Gaza were almost completely cut off. On the evening of 27 October, the IDF launched a large-scale ground assault on the towns of Beit Hanoun and Bureij in the Gaza Strip. Shayetet 13, a commando unit of the Israeli Navy, carried out a strike on Hamas naval forces overnight. An Israeli Skylark II drone was shot down on Gaza Strip. 28 October Israel said that the units deployed inside the Gaza Strip the previous night were still on the ground, which marked the beginning of the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip. The IDF announced it was "expanding ground operations" in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli military reissued a call to Gaza residents to evacuate the north as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the "second phase of the war has begun". The IDF advanced on three fronts: from the northeast near Beit Hanoun, from the northwest near Beit Lahia, and from the east near Juhor ad-Dik. 29 October Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO), described as "deeply concerning" reports from the Palestinian Red Crescent with smoke and dust, prompting staff to give breathing masks to some patients. Around 14,000 civilians were believed to be sheltering in or near the hospital. The al-Quds hospital had received an urgent evacuation warning along with a notice that it was "going to be bombarded". He reiterated that it was "impossible to evacuate hospitals full of patients without endangering their lives". Israeli airstrikes targeted the area around the hospital, filling parts of the building. Associated Press reported that Israeli airstrikes also destroyed roads leading to the Al-Shifa hospital, making it increasingly difficult to reach. Later in the day, Hamas said that Palestinian militants clashed with Israeli tanks in Salah al-Din Street in Gaza and forced them to retreat. The Institute for the Study of War also stated that Israel withdrew from the road. 30 October The IDF blocked the Salah al-Din Road, a major thoroughfare connecting the northern and southern parts of the Gaza Strip. Israeli tanks were also seen in the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City. A local resident told AFP that the Israelis "have cut the Salah al-Din road and are firing at any vehicle that tries to go along it." Witnesses reported, and a video showed, an Israeli tank firing on a taxi with a white flag on its roof that had attempted to turn around. An Israeli military spokesman said "The IDF was not shown any proof that this is a civilian car and there's no informat.... Discover the Samantha Garman popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Samantha Garman books.