AT LEAST 322 PALESTINIANS KILLED, MISSING WITHIN 5 HOURS AS ISRAEL RESUMES GENOCIDE IN GAZA

ANKARA, March 18 (Bernama-Anadolu) -- Gaza's local authorities said on Tuesday morning that over 322 Palestinians were killed or missing within five hours across the Gaza Strip as Israel resumed its genocide, breaking a ceasefire that had lasted nearly two months.

The Israeli army said early on Tuesday that it has conducted airstrikes in the Gaza Strip, the largest since a ceasefire with the Palestinian group Hamas took effect on Jan 19, Anadolu Ajansi reported.

In a statement, the Gaza Government Media Office said entire families were among the victims killed in the Israeli attacks, noting that ambulances and civil defence teams were unable to bring all victims to hospitals.

"These brutal massacres confirm once again that the Israeli occupation army only knows the language of killing, destruction, and genocide," the statement said.

It added that the resumption of massacres in Gaza comes alongside the ongoing suffocating siege imposed on the territory and the complete closure of crossings, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis and depriving over 2.4 million Palestinians in Gaza of basic necessities.

The media office urged the international community, including the United Nations Security Council and rights groups, to break the state of inaction and take immediate action to end the massacres in Gaza.

The Hamas group said that the Israeli government had declared war on Gaza by breaking the ceasefire agreement.

"We demand that the mediators hold Netanyahu and the Zionist occupation fully responsible for violating and overturning the agreement," it said in a statement.

Despite the ceasefire, local authorities in Gaza had reported almost daily violations by the Israeli army.

Israeli attacks have killed more than 48,500 Palestinians since October 2023, most of them women and children, leaving Gaza in ruins.

-- BERNAMA-ANADOLU