News Desk: A Palestinian boy stands next to the wreckage of a building, which was hit in an Israeli strike, in the southern Gaza Strip yesterday. A fresh wave of violence killed dozens in Gaza after the collapse of a UN and US backed ceasefire. Photo: AFP

At least 296 Palestinian children and adolescents have been killed since Israel launched its offensive in the Gaza Strip, the UN said yesterday as fighting escalated after a  humanitarian ceasefire collapsed to end the violence.

“Children make up for 30 percent of the civilian casualties,” said the UN children’s agency Unicef, adding that the toll was based on deaths which it was able to verify and was likely to rise.

“The number of child casualties during the last 48 hours may rise as a number of incidents are pending verification,” it said in a statement.
The toll breaks down to 187 boys and 109 girls, with at least 203 of them under the age of 12. More than 1,650 Palestinians in the Gaza enclave have been killed since Israel launched Operation Protective Edge last month, aimed at halting militant rocket fire.

Most of those killed have been civilians, and more than 8,900 have been wounded.

Israel has itself lost 63 soldiers, while two civilians and a Thai worker have been killed inside the Jewish state.

Israel intensified it’s Gaza bombardment yesterday after accusing Hamas of destroying the humanitarian ceasefire by capturing a soldier whom the Islamists say was probably killed in Israeli shelling.

The chances of the sides halting fire became more remote after Israel said it believed militants had captured a 23-year-old soldier in a Friday morning ambush near the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

Immediately afterwards, Israel began intensely bombing the Rafah area in shelling that is still ongoing, with medics saying it killed 114 people in 24 hours, 57 of them since midnight (2100 GMT Friday).

The alleged capture of Second Lieutenant Hadar Goldin drew sharp condemnation from the United Nations and the White House, who had jointly brokered the abortive 72-hour truce, and who demanded he be immediately released.

Israel has said it believes Goldin was snatched in an ambush that involved a suicide bomber, who killed two other soldiers, and has placed the blame squarely on Hamas.

Hamas’s armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, acknowledged its militants had staged an ambush early Friday in which soldiers were killed, but denied holding the missing man, saying the attackers were missing and presumed dead.

Israel said it was focusing its search for Goldin on the outskirts of the sprawling city of Rafah, an area home to some 210,00 Palestinians.
Israel considers the capture of its soldiers a casus belli.

In 2006, Gaza militants captured conscript Gilad Shalit and held him for five years before freeing him in exchange for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners.

Weeks after Shalit’s capture, Israel launched a 34-day war on the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon after it seized two soldiers, whose remains were later returned in another swap deal.

Since Friday, more than 400 houses have been levelled across Gaza, mostly by air strikes, Palestinian officials said.

And UN figures show that up to 25 percent of Gaza’s population of 1.8 million may have been forcibly displaced, with more than a quarter of a million people now seeking safety in shelters belonging to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

Despite the collapse of the ceasefire initiative, Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas is leading a delegation to Cairo for talks that his Egyptian counterpart said can offer a solution to the spiralling violence.

“Abbas has formed the delegation, which will head Saturday for Cairo whatever the circumstances,” his office said Friday of the 12-member group.

Ahead of the meeting, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said a truce proposal by Cairo “is the real chance to find a solution to the crisis in Gaza and to end the bloodshed”.

“Time is decisive, we have to take advantage of it quickly to douse the fire in the (Gaza) Strip… and to stop the bloodshed of Palestinians,” he told a news conference.

Meanwhile, the Israeli army yesterday informed residents of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza that it was “safe” to return to their homes, as witnesses said troops were seen withdrawing from the area.

It was the first time troops had been seen pulling back since the start of the devastating 26-day Gaza conflict.

Witnesses in Al-Atatra, which is part of Beit Lahiya, reported seeing troops pulling back, in a move mirrored in the south, where residents said the soldiers had withdrawn from villages east of Khan Yunis, close to the Israeli border.

The announcement came as unconfirmed media reports said Israel would not be sending a delegation to truce talks in Cairo, with some suggesting the pullback could signal the start of a unilateral Israeli withdrawal.