A Palestinian man holds the hand of a woman, who medics said was wounded in an Israeli air strike, in the northern Gaza Strip on Sunday. —Reuters GAZA CITY – Thousands of people fled Gaza's eastern Shijaiyah district early Sunday, many of them on foot, after heavy shelling left casualties lying in the streets. Ambulances were unable to reach much of the area along the border because of heavy fire, and emergency services said there were reports of dead and wounded trapped by the bombardment. Emergency services spokesman Ashraf Al-Qudra said that the bodies of at least 20 people from Shijaiyah had been retrieved, with hundreds of people wounded. He said the toll was expected to rise significantly. Paramedics said they were liaising with the International Committee of the Red Cross to try to coordinate entry into areas that were still under heavy fire. At least 40 people were killed in Gaza's Shijaiyah neighborhood, and five more bodies were believed buried under the rubble of homes, health officials said. They are the latest casualties in a nearly two-week conflict that has killed some 380 Palestinians and seven Israelis. After daybreak, dozens of wounded from Shijaiyah were rushed to Gaza City's central Shifa Hospital. Frantic parents carried children bloodied by shrapnel, and the emergency room quickly overflowed, forcing doctors to treat some patients on mattresses in a hallway. "The gate of hell has opened, and shrapnel came through the windows," said Shijaiyah resident Jawad Hassanain, speaking by phone. "The house shook, so I took my mother, my children, my brother as well, and we started seeking refuge in a nearby building." "From 12:30 a.m. until 4 a.m., all you could hear is heavy bombardment, the smell of fire and the smell of death. By 4:30, and after the call for the prayer, we were able to get in an ambulance," which took them to his sister's neighborhood, he said. Hamas said it accepted a Red Cross offer to hold fire for three hours to allow rescue services to tend to the dead and wounded in the area. There was no immediate response from Israel and the Red Cross could not immediately be reached for comment. Israeli troops pushed into Gaza late Thursday after more than a week of airstrikes failed to halt unrelenting Palestinian rocket fire that has increasingly targeted major Israeli cities. Israel has said the operation is aimed at halting the rockets as well as destroying cross-border tunnels that militants have used to stage raids into Israel. The military said it has hit more than 2,500 targets in Gaza. Throughout the night, loud explosions shook Gaza as Israeli flares lit up the sky and fighter jets flew low over the coastal territory. In Shijaiyah, the heavy shelling began around midnight as tanks reached the edge of the neighborhood, residents said. In the first hours of shelling, it was too dangerous for ambulances to approach and residents said they saw dead and wounded in the streets. Casualties were later evacuated. Hundreds of residents fled the neighborhood after daybreak, including a woman in a wheelchair who waved a white flag. Columns of smoke rose from the neighborhood as the sound of shelling echoed from inside. A man walking in the street said his son was trapped in the family house and that he needed someone to help rescue him. He then got into an ambulance to reach his house, but tank fire hit nearby and the ambulance quickly turned around to get away. The bodies of a man and a woman could be seen in the rubble of a house that had been completely destroyed. Among those killed in Shijaiyah on Sunday were Osama Al-Haya, a son of senior Hamas leader Khalil Al-Haya. Osama Al-Haya's wife and two children, ages four and six, were also killed, Palestinian health officials said. Some residents tried to find refuge with relatives, while others went to UN schools that have been serving as temporary shelters since the start of the fighting. Some 63,000 Palestinians are already staying in United Nations shelters, according to UNRWA, the UN refugee agency for Palestinians. That number has more than tripled since the start of Israel's ground operation and the agency said it planned to open more schools. – Agencies
