Israeli air strikes kill 143 across Gaza, more than 77 in Lebanon

More than 150 people are reported to have been killed in Israel’s latest attacks in northern Gaza and Lebanon, reports al Jazeera.

At least 93 Palestinians were killed when an Israeli attack flattened a five-storey residential building housing displaced people in northern Gaza’s Beit Lahiya on Tuesday, the head of Gaza’s Government Media Office said. Overnight, at least 60 people were killed in eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley.

Israel carried out the attacks as the humanitarian situation in both Gaza and Lebanon deteriorates. Conditions in northern Gaza, which has been under an Israeli siege since early October, are particularly harsh.

Despite the high death toll and worsening plight of those still living in northern Gaza, ceasefire talks that have resumed in Qatar are not expected to achieve a breakthrough while Israel has moved to halt the operations of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which is the main lifeline for most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Deir el-Balah in Gaza, described harrowing scenes from the strike in Beit Lahiya.

Dr Hussam Abu Safia, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, the main medical facility in northern Gaza, said more than 150 dead and wounded had arrived after the attack. However, he warned that many of those injured may die because of a lack of resources.

Israeli forces detained dozens of medical staff at the hospital last week, leaving only three doctors._Agencies.