KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli strikes and gunfire killed at least 33 Palestinians in Gaza on Saturday, including people sheltering in tents or seeking scarce food, local hospitals said as a famine in Gaza’s largest city puts new pressure on Israel over its 22-month offensive.
Israel’s defense minister has warned that Gaza City could be destroyed in a new military operation perhaps just days away, even as famine spreads there.
Aid groups have long warned that the war, sparked by Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack, and months of Israeli restrictions on food and medical supplies entering Gaza are causing starvation.
Israel has rejected the data-based famine declaration as “an outright lie.” Ceasefire efforts are on hold as mediators await Israel’s next steps.
Women and children struck and killed in tents
Israeli strikes killed at least 17 people in southern Gaza, more than half of them women and children, according to morgue records and health officials at Nasser Hospital. The officials said the strikes targeted tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis.
“Awad, why did you leave me?” a small boy asked his brother’s plastic-wrapped body.
Another grieving relative, Hekmat Foujo, pleaded for a truce.
“We want to rest,” Foujo said through her tears. ’’Have some mercy on us.”
In northern Gaza, Israeli gunfire killed at least five aid-seekers near the Zikim crossing with Israel, where U.N. and other truck convoys enter the territory, health officials at Sheikh Radwan field hospital told the AP.
The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said cameraman Khaled al-Madhoun was killed while covering events at the Zikim crossing, and asserted that he was targeted by Israeli troops. The local Palestine TV confirmed his death.
Eleven people were killed in attacks elsewhere, according to hospitals and the Palestinian Red Crescent.
Israel’s military said it was not aware of a strike in Khan Younis at that location and was looking into the other incidents.
AP journalists have seen chaos on roads leading to aid deliveries, and there have been almost daily reports of Israeli troops firing toward aid-seekers. Israel’s military says it fires warning shots if people approach troops or pose a threat.
Palestinians, including an injured man, ride on an aid truck returning to Gaza City from the northern Gaza Strip, Saturday, Aug. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
via Associated Press
Braving gunfire and crowds for food
Mohamed Saada was among thousands seeking food in the Zikim area — and one of many who left empty-handed. He cited the “huge numbers of people,” the shootings and “trucks running over people.”
Some carried sacks of food like lentils and flour. Others carried the wounded, including on a wooden pallet. They navigated fetid puddles and the rubble of war as temperatures reached above 92 degrees Fahrenheit (33 Celsius).
Friday’s famine report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification said nearly half a million people — about one-fourth of Gaza’s population — face catastrophic hunger.