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Gaza civil defence says Israeli strikes killed four Gaza City, Palestinian Territories, March 19 (AFP) Mar 19, 2026 Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli airstrikes killed four people on Thursday, in the latest violence to hit the war-shattered Palestinian territory despite the ceasefire. It came as Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt reopened for a limited number of people, for the first time since Israel and the United States launched strikes on Iran at the end of February. The civil defence agency, which operates as a rescue force under Hamas authority, said strikes in two neighbourhoods of Gaza City killed a total of four people. Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City said it received two bodies following an Israeli strike on the Tuffah neighbourhood east of Gaza City. Gaza City's Al-Shifa Hospital said it had also received two bodies following an Israeli drone strike on the Zeitoun neighbourhood in Gaza City. Media restrictions and limited access in Gaza have prevented AFP from independently verifying casualty figures or freely covering the fighting. When asked by AFP about the two incidents, the Israeli military said it was looking into the reports. In a separate statement, the Israeli military said it had struck and killed Muhammad Abu Shaleh, the military intelligence commander of Hamas's Khan Yunis Brigade. It said Shaleh had "operated in violation of the ceasefire agreement to rehabilitate the organisation's capabilities in the Gaza Strip and planned to carry out terror attacks against IDF troops and the State of Israel." Violence has persisted in Gaza despite a ceasefire which came into effect on October 10, with both Israel and Hamas regularly accusing each other of violations. On Sunday, Gaza's Hamas-run interior ministry said an Israeli airstrike on a police vehicle killed nine officers, with the civil defence reporting another four people killed in an earlier strike. Gaza's health ministry, which operates under Hamas authority, says at least 677 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the truce. The Israeli military says at least five of its soldiers have been killed in the same period since October 10. |
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