Int’l Desk:

The number of people killed by Israeli air strikes in Gaza rose to 103 on Thursday with women and children dominating the fatality list, reports BBC and Al Jazeera.

This comes as Palestinians mark the 77th anniversary of the Nakba, or catastrophe, when more than 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly expelled by Zionist paramilitary groups during the creation of Israel in 1948, according to Al Jazeera.

The latest killings have triggered new waves of displacement. Thousands fled Gaza City on Thursday after the Israeli military issued sudden forced evacuation orders the day before.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reported scenes of panic and fear as residents packed their belongings and tried to escape the expected onslaught.

The Israeli response to the Hamas attacks of 7 October 2023 has caused extensive damage to buildings and infrastructure in Gaza.

Analysts suggest almost 59.8% of buildings across the Strip had been damaged or destroyed since the start of the war by the time a ceasefire was declared in January this year.

Israel ended the ceasefire on 18 March and that figure had risen to 60.4% by 28 April, according to Corey Scher of CUNY Graduate Center, and Jamon Van Den Hoek of Oregon State University. Both base their assessments on satellite data. Rafah in the south has suffered the biggest jump in damage, they added.

Now, Israel has also started laying the groundworks for a widely condemned US-backed humanitarian plan. The Zionist regime has been preparing a series of sites in Gaza that could be used as distribution centres for humanitarian aid in a controversial new plan, BBC reviewed satellite images show.

The Israeli government suspended food and medicine deliveries into Gaza in March, causing severe shortages. A UN-backed assessment has warned around 2.1 million people are at “critical risk” of famine.

Images analysed by BBC Verify show that land has already been cleared, with new roads and staging areas constructed at four sites in southern and central Gaza in recent weeks.

Our analysis of the imagery shows significant development at one of the sites in south-west Gaza, close to the ruins of a village that is now an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) base.

The Israeli-US plan has been widely condemned by Middle Eastern and European governments, and humanitarian groups and the UN have said they will not take part.

Olga Cherevko, a spokesperson for the the UN’s aid coordination office (OCHA), accused Israel of seeking to use “food and fuel as leverage, as part of a military strategy”.