Israel flattens Gaza district, hits Orthodox church as invasion looms

Israel levelled a northern Gaza district on Friday after giving families a half-hour warning to escape, and hit an Orthodox Christian church where others had been sheltering as it made clear that a command to invade Gaza was expected soon, reports Reuters.

The Secretary General of the United Nations visited the crossing between the besieged Gaza Strip and Egypt, and said humanitarian aid must be allowed across as soon as possible.

Israel has vowed to wipe out the Hamas Islamist group that rules Gaza, after its gunmen burst through the barrier fence surrounding the enclave on Oct. 7 and rampaged through Israeli towns and kibbutzes, killing 1,400 people, mainly civilians.

Since then Israel has relentlessly pounded Gaza with air strikes and put the enclave‍‍`s 2.3 million people under a total siege, banning even shipments of food, fuel and medical supplies.

At least 4,137 Palestinians have been killed, including hundreds of children, and 13,000 wounded in Gaza, the Palestinian health ministry said.

The U.N. says more than a million have been made homeless.

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, who told troops the previous day that an order to invade would come soon, said on Friday that achieving Israel‍‍`s objectives would not be quick or easy.

"We will topple the Hamas organisation. We will destroy its military and governing infrastructure. It‍‍`s a phase that will not be easy. It will have a price," he told a parliamentary committee.

He added that the subsequent phase would be more drawn out, but was aimed at achieving "a completely different security situation" with no threat to Israel from Gaza. "It‍‍`s not a day, it‍‍`s not a week, and unfortunately it‍‍`s not a month," he said.

CHURCH HIT

The Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, the main Palestinian Christian denomination, said that overnight Israeli forces had struck the Church of Saint Porphyrius in Gaza City, where hundreds of Christians and Muslims had sought sanctuary.

It said targeting churches that were used as shelters for people fleeing bombing was "a war crime that cannot be ignored".

Video from the scene showed a wounded boy being carried from rubble at night. A civil defence worker said two people on upper floors had survived; those on lower floors had been killed and their bodies were still in the rubble.

"They felt they would be safe here. They came from under the bombardment and the destruction, and they said they would be safe here but destruction chased them," a man cried out.

Gaza‍‍`s Hamas-run government media office said 18 Christian Palestinians had been killed, while the health ministry later gave a toll of 16.

The Israeli military said part of the church was damaged in a strike by fighter jets on a nearby Hamas command centre involved in launching rockets and mortars towards Israel, and that it was reviewing the incident.

"The IDF (Israel Defence Forces) can unequivocally state that the church was not the target of the strike," it said.