The Israeli military has initiated a ground operation against Hamas in the Bureij refugee camp and east of Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. Troops, supported by air strikes, are targeting “terrorists and terrorist infrastructure above and below ground,” according to a statement from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Médecins Sans Frontières reported that at least 70 dead and 300 wounded, mostly women and children, have been brought to a hospital in Deir al-Balah since Tuesday. Meanwhile, US, Egyptian, and Qatari mediators are meeting in Doha and Cairo to finalize a new ceasefire and hostage release deal.
The US announced on Tuesday that it is still awaiting a response from Hamas to an Israeli proposal outlined by President Joe Biden on Friday. Qatar confirmed it had delivered the plan to Hamas representatives and is also awaiting a clear position from the Israeli government.
Israel launched its military campaign in Gaza following Hamas’s cross-border attack on southern Israel on October 7, which resulted in around 1,200 deaths and 251 hostages taken. Since then, Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry reported at least 36,580 deaths.
Bureij, one of Gaza’s smallest historic refugee camps, spans 0.5 sq km (0.2 sq miles) and had 46,000 residents registered with the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) before the war.
Located just south of the Wadi Gaza riverbed, Bureij is near the IDF’s “Central Gaza Strip Corridor”—a section of land controlled by Israeli forces that runs east to west from the border with Israel to the Mediterranean Sea, dividing Gaza.
Additionally, the Nuseirat and Maghazi refugee camps are situated near Bureij, while Deir al-Balah lies about 5km (3 miles) to the southwest. These areas are currently overcrowded with people displaced by fighting elsewhere, including many of the more than a million who have fled from the southern city of Rafah since the onset of the Israeli ground operation a month ago.
Earlier this year, IDF troops conducted a ground operation against Hamas fighters in the central Gaza camps, which lasted several weeks.
On Wednesday, the IDF said the new “targeted” operation in Bureij and eastern Deir al-Balah was aimed at dismantling “terrorist infrastructure located several kilometres away from the border with Israel above and below ground”.
“The activity started with a series of aerial strikes on terror targets, including military compounds, weapons storage facilities, and underground infrastructure,” its statement added. “During the strikes, several Hamas terrorists were eliminated.”
A man from Bureij told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Today programme that his family fled the camp as the Israeli bombardment intensified on Tuesday.
