GAZA: Israeli warplanes pounded Gaza, sending scores of wounded and dead pouring into hospitals, and rocket sirens blared in southern Israel on Friday as war resumed after a week-old truce ran out with no deal to extend it.
As the deadline lapsed, Khan Younis in southern Gaza eastern areas came under intensive bombardment, sending columns of smoke rising into the sky. Residents took to the streets, fleeing for shelter further west and ferrying dead and injured people into hospitals.
In the north of the enclave, previously the main war zone, huge plumes of smoke rose above the ruins, seen from across the fence in Israel. The rattle of gunfire and thud of explosions rang out above the sound of barking dogs.
Barely two hours after the truce expired, Gaza health officials reported that 54 people had already been killed and dozens wounded in air strikes that hit at least eight homes.
Medics and witnesses said the bombing was most intensive in Khan Younis and Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, areas where hundreds of thousands of Gazans have been sheltering from fighting further north. Houses in central and northern areas were also hit.
Gazans feared that the intense bombing of southern Gaza heralded an expansion of the war into areas Israel had previously described as safe.
Leaflets dropped on eastern areas of the main southern city Khan Younis ordered residents of four towns to evacuate – not to other areas in Khan Younis as in the past, but further south to the crowded town of Rafah on the Egyptian border.
