By ordering civilians out of one third of the Strip, Israel fans the fears of Palestinians and hopes of Jewish settlers

Residents said Israeli forces besieged shelters housing displaced families and the remaining population, which some estimated at a few thousand, ordering them to head south through a checkpoint separating two towns and a refugee camp in the north from Gaza City.

Several people were killed in Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian media reported on Thursday. The Palestinian news agency WAFA said that Israeli fire near Gaza City killed four Palestinians in the morning,

Israeli airstrikes killed at least 46 people in the Gaza Strip in the past 24 hours, including 11 at a makeshift cafeteria in an Israeli-declared humanitarian zone, medics said. In Lebanon, warplanes struck Beirut's southern suburbs and killed 18 people elsewhere in the country on Tuesday.