War rages on in Gaza while deal emerges to deliver medicine to hostages

RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian terrorists battled Israeli forces in northern Gaza and launched a barrage of rockets from farther south on Tuesday more than 100 days into Israel’s air and ground campaign against Hamas.

In other developments, France and Qatar, the Persian Gulf nation that helped mediate a previous cease-fire, said late Tuesday that they had brokered a deal between Israel and Hamas to deliver medicine to Israeli hostages in Gaza, as well as additional aid to Palestinians in the territory.

France said it had been working since October on the deal, which will provide three months’ worth of medication for 45 hostages with chronic illnesses, as well as other medicines and vitamins. The medicines are expected to enter Gaza from Egypt on Wednesday.

It was the first known agreement between the warring sides since a weeklong truce in November.

Israel has vowed to crush Hamas’ military and governing capabilities to ensure that the Oct. 7 terrorist attack that triggered the war is never repeated. Terrorists stormed into Israel from Gaza that day, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and capturing around 250 people.

With strong diplomatic and military support from the United States, Israel has resisted international calls for a cease-fire.

Nearly half of the hostages were released during the truce, but more than 100 remain in captivity. Hamas has said it will not release any others until Israel ends the war.

In Gaza, the Israeli military said its forces located some 100 rocket installations and 60 ready-to-use rockets in the area of Beit Lahiya, a town on the territory’s northern edge. Israeli forces killed dozens of terrorists during the operation, the military said.

Mahmoud Abdel-Ghani, who lives in Beit Lahiya, said Israeli airstrikes hit several buildings on the eastern side of the town.

Residents reached by phone Tuesday described the heaviest fighting in weeks in Gaza City.

After weeks of heavy fighting across northern Gaza, Israeli officials said at the start of the year that they were scaling back operations there. The focus shifted to the southern city of Khan Younis and refugee camps in central Gaza.

There too, they have encountered heavy resistance. The military said at least 25 rockets were fired into Israel on Tuesday, damaging a store in one of the strongest bombardments in more than a week. Israel’s Channel 12 television said the rockets were launched from the Bureij camp in central Gaza.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said Tuesday that the bodies of 158 people killed in Israeli strikes have been brought to hospitals in the past 24 hours, bringing the war’s overall death toll to 24,285. The ministry does not differentiate between civilian and combatant deaths.

Israel blames the high civilian death toll on Hamas because it fights in dense residential areas. Israel says its forces have killed roughly 8,000 terrorists, and that 190 of its own soldiers have been killed in the Gaza offensive.

Senior U.N. officials warned Monday that Gaza faces widespread famine and disease if more aid is not allowed in.

Israeli officials say they have placed no limits on humanitarian aid and have called on the U.N. to provide more workers and trucks to accelerate delivery.

———

Magdy reported from Cairo. Lidman reported from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press writers Jon Gambrell in Jerusalem and Sylvie Corbet in Paris contributed to this report.