Sawt Falasteen - Israel flattens Gaza City high-rise as it tells residents to flee

Israel has been warning for weeks of a new assault on the territory's largest urban centre, without issuing a timeline.

It has stepped up air strikes in the area and operations on the city's outskirts despite calls to abandon the plan, which has sparked widespread fears it could worsen already-dire humanitarian conditions.

On Saturday, the military announced it struck a Gaza City high-rise, saying "Hamas terrorists installed intelligence gathering equipment and positioned observation posts in the building in order to monitor" Israeli troops, adding it had taken "measures to mitigate harm to civilians".

Witnesses identified the building as the Sussi residential tower and said it was destroyed, with video shared by Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz showing the roughly 15-storey structure buckling to the ground in a cloud of dust and smoke.

"We're continuing," Katz said in the post, after having shared a video the previous day of another Gaza City high-rise being destroyed.

The military has said that in the coming days it will target structures deemed to be used by Hamas, particularly tall buildings.

It also issued an evacuation order for another high-rise on Saturday, warning of an imminent strike and telling people to leave to the south.

A military spokesperson had earlier called on residents to leave the city for Al-Mawasi, along the southern coast, where the army said humanitarian aid and medical care would be provided.

"Take this opportunity to move early to the (Al-Mawasi) humanitarian zone and join the thousands of people who have already gone there," spokesman Avichay Adraee said on social media.

Israel first declared Al-Mawasi a safe zone early in the war, but has carried out repeated strikes on it since, saying it targeted Hamas fighters hiding among civilians.

Gaza City residents said they believed it made little difference whether they stayed or fled.

"Some say we should evacuate, others say we should stay," said Abdel Nasser Mushtaha, 48, a resident of the city's Zeitun neighbourhood now sheltering in a tent in the Rimal area.

"But everywhere in Gaza there are bombings and deaths. For the past year-and-a-half, the worst bombings that caused massacres of civilians have been in Al-Mawasi, this so-called humanitarian zone," he added.

"It no longer makes any difference to us," said his daughter Samia Mushtaha, 20. "Wherever we go, death pursues us, whether by bombing or hunger."

- US in 'deep negotiation' -

Israel has faced mounting domestic and international pressure to end the nearly two-year war in Gaza.

Its foe Hamas agreed last month to a proposal for a temporary ceasefire and staggered hostage releases, but Israel has demanded the militant group release all the hostages at once, disarm and relinquish control of Gaza, among other conditions.

At the White House on Friday, President Donald Trump said the United States was in talks with Hamas over the captives being held in Gaza.

"We're in very deep negotiation with Hamas," said Trump. "There could be some (hostages) that have recently died, is what I'm hearing. I hope that's wrong, but you have over 30 bodies in this negotiation."

Militants took 251 hostages during the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the war. The Israeli military says 47 remain in Gaza, including 25 believed to be dead.

"We said let them all out right now, let them all out, and much better things will happen for them," said Trump. "But if you don't let them all out, it's going to be a tough situation, it's going to be nasty."

- 'Disaster' -

The UN estimates nearly one million people remain in and around Gaza City, where it declared a famine last month. It has warned of a looming "disaster" if the assault proceeds.

The vast majority of Gaza's population of more than two million people have been displaced at least once during the war.

Hamas's 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed at least 64,368 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency or the Israeli military.

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Y.AlMasri--SF-PST