Skip to content Skip to footer

Israel’s New Year Strikes on Gaza Leave Over 20 Dead, Including Children

Two refugee camps were bombed as civilians face growing risk of disease and starvation.

Palestinian children inspect the damage at the site of an Israeli strike the previous night, in Jabalia, in the central Gaza Strip on January 1, 2025.

Israel’s U.S.-backed assault on the Gaza Strip continued unabated on the first day of 2025, with airstrikes and drone attacks across the besieged enclave killing more than 20 people on Wednesday, including women and children.

One Israeli strike on the Jabilia refugee camp in northern Gaza killed at least 15 people, including four children and one woman, according to Al Jazeera. Others are still missing under the ruins of the house targeted by Israeli forces, which have systematically destroyed the Palestinian territory’s civilian infrastructure during the nearly 15-month assault.

The Associated Press reported that “another strike overnight in the built-up Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza killed a woman and a child, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, which received the bodies.”

“A third strike early Wednesday in the southern city of Khan Younis killed three people, according to the nearby Nasser Hospital and the European Hospital, which received the bodies,” AP added.

Gaza’s Ministry of Health said Wednesday that the Israeli military’s latest attacks pushed the official death toll in the enclave since October 7, 2023 to 45,553 — a count that experts believe dramatically understates the actual toll.

Israel’s incessant attacks and obstruction of humanitarian assistance have turned Gaza into what one aid group recently called a “death trap,” with no safe place for civilians who are at growing risk of disease and starvation — emergency conditions exacerbated by winter weather.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) said Tuesday that six babies have frozen to death in Gaza in recent days.

“More babies will likely die due to the cold, lack of shelter, and basic winter supplies,” the organization warned. “Blankets, mattresses, and warm clothes are sitting outside Gaza waiting for approval to get in. The siege must be lifted.”

Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA’s commissioner-general, said Tuesday that “horrors continue” in Gaza “under the world’s watch,” pointing to Israel’s killing of aid workers, attacks on U.N. shelters, and torture of detainees.

“In northern Gaza, since the intensification of the military operation nearly three months ago, there has been a significant increase in attacks on our staff, buildings, and operations,” said Lazzarini. “I reiterate my call for independent investigations into the systematic disregard for the protection of humanitarian workers, premises, and operations. This cannot become the new standard and impunity cannot become the new norm.”

Angry, shocked, overwhelmed? Take action: Support independent media.

We’ve borne witness to a chaotic first few months in Trump’s presidency.

Over the last months, each executive order has delivered shock and bewilderment — a core part of a strategy to make the right-wing turn feel inevitable and overwhelming. But, as organizer Sandra Avalos implored us to remember in Truthout last November, “Together, we are more powerful than Trump.”

Indeed, the Trump administration is pushing through executive orders, but — as we’ve reported at Truthout — many are in legal limbo and face court challenges from unions and civil rights groups. Efforts to quash anti-racist teaching and DEI programs are stalled by education faculty, staff, and students refusing to comply. And communities across the country are coming together to raise the alarm on ICE raids, inform neighbors of their civil rights, and protect each other in moving shows of solidarity.

It will be a long fight ahead. And as nonprofit movement media, Truthout plans to be there documenting and uplifting resistance.

As we undertake this life-sustaining work, we appeal for your support. We have 10 days left in our fundraiser: Please, if you find value in what we do, join our community of sustainers by making a monthly or one-time gift.