Backed by Trump, Israel Shreds Cease-Fire Deal and Kills Over 400 Across Gaza
"This return to violence does not come as a surprise," said one advocacy group. "Netanyahu has, from the beginning, signaled his intention to abandon the cease-fire process before it could become a lasting peace."
People mourn relatives killed by Israeli airstrikes in central Gaza on March 18, 2025.
(Photo: Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images)
"This return to violence does not come as a surprise," said one advocacy group. "Netanyahu has, from the beginning, signaled his intention to abandon the cease-fire process before it could become a lasting peace."
People mourn relatives killed by Israeli airstrikes in central Gaza on March 18, 2025.
(Photo: Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Jake Johnson
Mar 18, 2025
COMMON DREANS
A barrage of Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip early Tuesday killed more than 400 people and left a fragile cease-fire agreement in tatters just over two months after it was reached, with Israel's prime minister pledging "increasing military strength" in an enclave already decimated by more than a year of bombing.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that the Netanyahu government consulted with the Trump administration ahead of the latest Gaza bombardment. Leavitt expressed the White House's total support for Israel's attacks.
While Israel had been carrying out more limited deadly attacks on Gaza despite the cease-fire deal—including strikes over the weekend that killed at least nine—Tuesday's bombings were described as the "heaviest assault on the territory since the cease-fire took effect in January."
The cease-fire was a multiphase agreement, with the first phase expiring earlier this month. Talks over the second phase of the agreement had stalled, and the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had attempted to impose an alternative deal on Hamas with the backing of the Trump White House. Israel imposed a total siege on the Gaza Strip earlier this month in an attempt to force acceptance of its alternative, leaving more than 1 million children in desperate conditions.
The New York Times reported that the Rafah crossing into Egypt "has been shuttered amid the renewed Israeli strikes." The border zone, the Times noted, "had been the main way for sick and wounded Gazans to leave the enclave during the cease-fire."
Muhannad Hadi, humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, said in a statement Tuesday that the fresh wave of Israeli airstrikes "is unconscionable" and that a cease-fire "must be reinstated immediately."
"People in Gaza have endured unimaginable suffering," said Hadi. "An end to hostilities, sustained humanitarian assistance, release of the hostages, and the restoration of basic services and people’s livelihoods, are the only way forward."
"From before his first day in office, President Trump has endorsed the Netanyahu government's return to war."
Gaza health officials said the Israeli strikes killed at least 400 people, including women and children. Reutersreported that "in hospitals strained by 15 months of bombardment, piles of bodies in white plastic sheets smeared with blood could be seen stacked up as casualties were brought in."
Netanyahu's office said in a statement posted to social media that the Israeli military launched the large-scale strikes due to Hamas' "repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from U.S. Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators."
Hamas responded that Israel is "fully responsible for violating and overturning the agreement."
The Israeli strikes came over a month after the Trump administration approved a $7.4 billion sale of U.S. weaponry to Israel, which has repeatedly used American arms to commit war crimes in Gaza.
Sara Haghdoosti, executive director of the U.S.-based advocacy group Win Without War, said in a statement that "we are heartbroken and enraged at the Netanyahu government's decision to break the cease-fire in Gaza and resume widespread, devastating bombing."
"This return to violence does not come as a surprise, however," said Haghdoosti. "Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has, from the beginning, signaled his intention to abandon the cease-fire process before it could become a lasting peace. From before his first day in office, President Trump has endorsed the Netanyahu government's return to war. Indeed, we fear that Trump's vile plan for ethnic cleansing in Gaza, so welcomed by the far-right members of Netanyahu's government, will become the blueprint for the war as it goes forward."
"Both the blockade and the return to bombing appear designed to create conditions in which Palestinians can no longer live in the Gaza Strip," Haghdoosti added. "We, and every person of conscience around the world, condemn this campaign of ethnic cleansing unequivocally."
Mar 18, 2025
COMMON DREANS
A barrage of Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip early Tuesday killed more than 400 people and left a fragile cease-fire agreement in tatters just over two months after it was reached, with Israel's prime minister pledging "increasing military strength" in an enclave already decimated by more than a year of bombing.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that the Netanyahu government consulted with the Trump administration ahead of the latest Gaza bombardment. Leavitt expressed the White House's total support for Israel's attacks.
While Israel had been carrying out more limited deadly attacks on Gaza despite the cease-fire deal—including strikes over the weekend that killed at least nine—Tuesday's bombings were described as the "heaviest assault on the territory since the cease-fire took effect in January."
The cease-fire was a multiphase agreement, with the first phase expiring earlier this month. Talks over the second phase of the agreement had stalled, and the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had attempted to impose an alternative deal on Hamas with the backing of the Trump White House. Israel imposed a total siege on the Gaza Strip earlier this month in an attempt to force acceptance of its alternative, leaving more than 1 million children in desperate conditions.
The New York Times reported that the Rafah crossing into Egypt "has been shuttered amid the renewed Israeli strikes." The border zone, the Times noted, "had been the main way for sick and wounded Gazans to leave the enclave during the cease-fire."
Muhannad Hadi, humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, said in a statement Tuesday that the fresh wave of Israeli airstrikes "is unconscionable" and that a cease-fire "must be reinstated immediately."
"People in Gaza have endured unimaginable suffering," said Hadi. "An end to hostilities, sustained humanitarian assistance, release of the hostages, and the restoration of basic services and people’s livelihoods, are the only way forward."
"From before his first day in office, President Trump has endorsed the Netanyahu government's return to war."
Gaza health officials said the Israeli strikes killed at least 400 people, including women and children. Reutersreported that "in hospitals strained by 15 months of bombardment, piles of bodies in white plastic sheets smeared with blood could be seen stacked up as casualties were brought in."
Netanyahu's office said in a statement posted to social media that the Israeli military launched the large-scale strikes due to Hamas' "repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from U.S. Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators."
Hamas responded that Israel is "fully responsible for violating and overturning the agreement."
The Israeli strikes came over a month after the Trump administration approved a $7.4 billion sale of U.S. weaponry to Israel, which has repeatedly used American arms to commit war crimes in Gaza.
Sara Haghdoosti, executive director of the U.S.-based advocacy group Win Without War, said in a statement that "we are heartbroken and enraged at the Netanyahu government's decision to break the cease-fire in Gaza and resume widespread, devastating bombing."
"This return to violence does not come as a surprise, however," said Haghdoosti. "Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has, from the beginning, signaled his intention to abandon the cease-fire process before it could become a lasting peace. From before his first day in office, President Trump has endorsed the Netanyahu government's return to war. Indeed, we fear that Trump's vile plan for ethnic cleansing in Gaza, so welcomed by the far-right members of Netanyahu's government, will become the blueprint for the war as it goes forward."
"Both the blockade and the return to bombing appear designed to create conditions in which Palestinians can no longer live in the Gaza Strip," Haghdoosti added. "We, and every person of conscience around the world, condemn this campaign of ethnic cleansing unequivocally."
Israel Kills 400 in Gaza, Resuming Bombings After Months of Ceasefire Violations
Israeli forces have unleashed an intense assault across Gaza, killing at least 174 Palestinian children, reports say.
By Sharon Zhang ,
Israeli forces have unleashed an intense assault across Gaza, killing at least 174 Palestinian children, reports say.
By Sharon Zhang ,
March 18, 2025
People look through the rubble in a house after an Israeli strike in Gaza City on March 18, 2025.
Majdi Fathi / NurPhoto via Getty Images
Israel has resumed its heavy bombing of civilians in Gaza, killing at least 404 Palestinians over the course of a single day. The attacks are a major violation — and potentially unilateral ending — of the already-fragile ceasefire and captive release deal.
On Tuesday, Israel dropped a huge number of bombs across Gaza without any forewarning, with Palestinians reporting intense shelling and being surrounded by the sound of Israeli quadcopters. The severity of the strikes mirrors the early days of Israel’s genocide, Palestinians have said.
Palestinians have described waking up to the sound of Israeli bombs killing entire families, as Al Jazeera reports. Meanwhile, hospitals are overwhelmed with patients amid severe supply shortages due to Israel’s blockade over the past 16 months of the genocide. Even basic supplies like gauze and disinfectant are in short supply, while fuel supplies allowed in by Israel in the first weeks of the ceasefire are also running low, in the third week of Israel’s renewed total aid blockade.
Officials say that Israel’s bombings on Tuesday wounded at least 562 people. At least 174 children are among those killed, Drop Site reports, citing a Gaza Ministry of Health official.
A Gaza Ministry of Health official told The Associated Press that Tuesday’s attacks mark the single deadliest day in Gaza since the start of the genocide, with more deaths likely to be recorded in the coming hours and days. Nowhere is safe from the massacres, reports say, with even Israel’s designated “safe zone” reportedly coming under Israeli fire.
“We were sleeping when suddenly a volcano descended on my children’s heads,” said Muhammad al-Sakani, to Mondoweiss, outside of al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City. Two of his children were killed in the attacks. “This is the bank of targets of Netanyahu, Trump, and all the other cowards.”
“Their only crime is that our enemy is a criminal who assassinates children and women as they sleep,” Al-Sakani said, of his children.
The Trump administration signed off on Israel’s attack, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in an interview on Monday. She pledged that “all hell will break loose” on Hamas, as well as “the Houthis, Iran, all those who seek to terrorize not just Israel but also the United States.”
Hamas officials said that they view the attacks as a “decision to overturn the ceasefire agreement” by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government. The group added that the U.S. bears responsibility for the slaughter.
“The acknowledgment by the U.S. administration that it was informed in advance of the Zionist aggression confirms its direct partnership in the war of extermination against our people,” the group said. “With its unlimited political and military support for the occupation, Washington bears full responsibility for the massacres and killing of women and children in Gaza.”
Netanyahu said in a statement that “Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength.”
He ordered the military to carry out the bombings in response to Hamas’s refusal to release more Israeli captives and continue the ceasefire deal, the statement said — but Hamas has repeatedly said that they are committed to the original ceasefire agreement, which would have entailed a full release of the remaining captives and a permanent end to Israel’s siege of Gaza.
Commentators have noted that Netanyahu’s personal political considerations also weigh heavily on the decision to resume the massacres. Netanyahu is on trial for a series of corruption charges, and was supposed to testify on Tuesday, the same day of the new attack. That hearing was postponed due to the attack.
Gaza officials have said that the resumption of the bombings only confirms that Israel was never interested in carrying out the ceasefire agreement in full. Israel has already committed numerous ceasefire violations over the past months, killing an average of three Palestinians a day for a total count of at least 150 killings.
“These brutal massacres committed by the Israeli occupation army reaffirm that this occupation only understands the language of killing, destruction, and genocide,” the Gaza Government Media Office said. “They expose the true intentions of the occupation in shedding the blood of innocent people without the slightest moral or legal restraint, proving that they have a premeditated plan to continue committing genocide against children and women, as seen on the ground. It confirms that this is an occupation thirsty for blood.”
Israel has resumed its heavy bombing of civilians in Gaza, killing at least 404 Palestinians over the course of a single day. The attacks are a major violation — and potentially unilateral ending — of the already-fragile ceasefire and captive release deal.
On Tuesday, Israel dropped a huge number of bombs across Gaza without any forewarning, with Palestinians reporting intense shelling and being surrounded by the sound of Israeli quadcopters. The severity of the strikes mirrors the early days of Israel’s genocide, Palestinians have said.
Palestinians have described waking up to the sound of Israeli bombs killing entire families, as Al Jazeera reports. Meanwhile, hospitals are overwhelmed with patients amid severe supply shortages due to Israel’s blockade over the past 16 months of the genocide. Even basic supplies like gauze and disinfectant are in short supply, while fuel supplies allowed in by Israel in the first weeks of the ceasefire are also running low, in the third week of Israel’s renewed total aid blockade.
Officials say that Israel’s bombings on Tuesday wounded at least 562 people. At least 174 children are among those killed, Drop Site reports, citing a Gaza Ministry of Health official.
A Gaza Ministry of Health official told The Associated Press that Tuesday’s attacks mark the single deadliest day in Gaza since the start of the genocide, with more deaths likely to be recorded in the coming hours and days. Nowhere is safe from the massacres, reports say, with even Israel’s designated “safe zone” reportedly coming under Israeli fire.
“We were sleeping when suddenly a volcano descended on my children’s heads,” said Muhammad al-Sakani, to Mondoweiss, outside of al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City. Two of his children were killed in the attacks. “This is the bank of targets of Netanyahu, Trump, and all the other cowards.”
“Their only crime is that our enemy is a criminal who assassinates children and women as they sleep,” Al-Sakani said, of his children.
The Trump administration signed off on Israel’s attack, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in an interview on Monday. She pledged that “all hell will break loose” on Hamas, as well as “the Houthis, Iran, all those who seek to terrorize not just Israel but also the United States.”
Hamas officials said that they view the attacks as a “decision to overturn the ceasefire agreement” by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government. The group added that the U.S. bears responsibility for the slaughter.
“The acknowledgment by the U.S. administration that it was informed in advance of the Zionist aggression confirms its direct partnership in the war of extermination against our people,” the group said. “With its unlimited political and military support for the occupation, Washington bears full responsibility for the massacres and killing of women and children in Gaza.”
Netanyahu said in a statement that “Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength.”
He ordered the military to carry out the bombings in response to Hamas’s refusal to release more Israeli captives and continue the ceasefire deal, the statement said — but Hamas has repeatedly said that they are committed to the original ceasefire agreement, which would have entailed a full release of the remaining captives and a permanent end to Israel’s siege of Gaza.
Commentators have noted that Netanyahu’s personal political considerations also weigh heavily on the decision to resume the massacres. Netanyahu is on trial for a series of corruption charges, and was supposed to testify on Tuesday, the same day of the new attack. That hearing was postponed due to the attack.
Gaza officials have said that the resumption of the bombings only confirms that Israel was never interested in carrying out the ceasefire agreement in full. Israel has already committed numerous ceasefire violations over the past months, killing an average of three Palestinians a day for a total count of at least 150 killings.
“These brutal massacres committed by the Israeli occupation army reaffirm that this occupation only understands the language of killing, destruction, and genocide,” the Gaza Government Media Office said. “They expose the true intentions of the occupation in shedding the blood of innocent people without the slightest moral or legal restraint, proving that they have a premeditated plan to continue committing genocide against children and women, as seen on the ground. It confirms that this is an occupation thirsty for blood.”
Israel’s Assault Marks One of the Deadliest Days for Children in Gaza History
“Israeli forces have signed a death warrant for Palestinian children in Gaza,” one rights group worker said.
By Sharon Zhang ,
UN Report: Israel’s Gender-Based Violence in Gaza Amounts to “Genocidal Acts”
Israel’s bombing of a crucial IVF clinic and destruction of 4,000 embryos was an act of genocide, experts found. By Sharon Zhang , Truthout March 14, 2025
Israel’s bombardment on Tuesday, which came amid the holy month of Ramadan, was horrific. Palestinians described being woken up by earth-shaking blasts all around them, with the Israeli military once again raining down bombs across the Strip without regard for civilian life.
The ceasefire had brought some temporary relief to Palestinians — though Israel renewed its total blockade on humanitarian aid in recent weeks and soldiers continued to target and kill people across the region, Palestinians were hopeful that the period of relative peace would last. But that feeling has been shattered, many Palestinians report.
The head of Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, Ramy Abdu, said that his sister’s entire family, including her three children, were among those killed in Israel’s assault on Tuesday.
“Israel may kill us at will, burn us alive, and tear us apart, but it will never succeed in uprooting us from our land. Justice and accountability await — no matter how long it takes,” Abdu said on social media, sharing a picture of his niece and nephew, Omar and Lian. In the photo, the young children are sitting next to each other, smiling at the camera.
A Palestinian doctor, obstetrics-gynecology specialist Majda Abu Aker, was also killed along with her family in their home in southern Gaza, per Al Jazeera. The strike killed over a dozen people, including 10 people in the same family. The casualties included a three-day-old girl.
Israeli forces have killed over 18,000 Palestinian children in Gaza since October 7, 2023, according to health officials. However, the true toll is likely far higher, as DCIP pointed out, “as children continue to suffer from serious communicable and preventable conditions like hypothermia, malnutrition, dehydration, and scabies.”
“Israeli forces have signed a death warrant for Palestinian children in Gaza,” one rights group worker said.
By Sharon Zhang ,
March 18, 2025
A Palestinian girl salvages items from a damaged house near the Qrayqea family house that was destroyed in Israeli strikes at dawn in the Shujaiya district in eastern Gaza City on March 18, 2025.
Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP via Getty Image
Israel killed at least 174 children in its ceasefire-shattering assault on Gaza on Tuesday, making it one of the deadliest 24 hours for children in Gaza’s history, Defense for Children International-Palestine (DCIP) has said.
The death toll is expected to rise even further, the group noted, with many people missing under the rubble following Israel’s renewed carpet bombing in Gaza.
Over 400 Palestinians in total were killed in Tuesday’s assault, with over 500 wounded, according to health officials. The attack was a clear violation of the ceasefire agreement, at a time when Israel is also worsening the humanitarian catastrophe it has created in the region.
“Today marks one of the largest one-day child death tolls in Gaza in history,” said Ayed Abu Eqtaish, DCIP’s accountability program director.
“Israeli forces have signed a death warrant for Palestinian children in Gaza as they carry out nonstop attacks, continue to destroy civilian infrastructure, and prevent any humanitarian aid from reaching Palestinians in need,” Eqtaish went on. “This is nothing short of genocide.”
Israel killed at least 174 children in its ceasefire-shattering assault on Gaza on Tuesday, making it one of the deadliest 24 hours for children in Gaza’s history, Defense for Children International-Palestine (DCIP) has said.
The death toll is expected to rise even further, the group noted, with many people missing under the rubble following Israel’s renewed carpet bombing in Gaza.
Over 400 Palestinians in total were killed in Tuesday’s assault, with over 500 wounded, according to health officials. The attack was a clear violation of the ceasefire agreement, at a time when Israel is also worsening the humanitarian catastrophe it has created in the region.
“Today marks one of the largest one-day child death tolls in Gaza in history,” said Ayed Abu Eqtaish, DCIP’s accountability program director.
“Israeli forces have signed a death warrant for Palestinian children in Gaza as they carry out nonstop attacks, continue to destroy civilian infrastructure, and prevent any humanitarian aid from reaching Palestinians in need,” Eqtaish went on. “This is nothing short of genocide.”
UN Report: Israel’s Gender-Based Violence in Gaza Amounts to “Genocidal Acts”
Israel’s bombing of a crucial IVF clinic and destruction of 4,000 embryos was an act of genocide, experts found. By Sharon Zhang , Truthout March 14, 2025
Israel’s bombardment on Tuesday, which came amid the holy month of Ramadan, was horrific. Palestinians described being woken up by earth-shaking blasts all around them, with the Israeli military once again raining down bombs across the Strip without regard for civilian life.
The ceasefire had brought some temporary relief to Palestinians — though Israel renewed its total blockade on humanitarian aid in recent weeks and soldiers continued to target and kill people across the region, Palestinians were hopeful that the period of relative peace would last. But that feeling has been shattered, many Palestinians report.
The head of Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, Ramy Abdu, said that his sister’s entire family, including her three children, were among those killed in Israel’s assault on Tuesday.
“Israel may kill us at will, burn us alive, and tear us apart, but it will never succeed in uprooting us from our land. Justice and accountability await — no matter how long it takes,” Abdu said on social media, sharing a picture of his niece and nephew, Omar and Lian. In the photo, the young children are sitting next to each other, smiling at the camera.
A Palestinian doctor, obstetrics-gynecology specialist Majda Abu Aker, was also killed along with her family in their home in southern Gaza, per Al Jazeera. The strike killed over a dozen people, including 10 people in the same family. The casualties included a three-day-old girl.
Israeli forces have killed over 18,000 Palestinian children in Gaza since October 7, 2023, according to health officials. However, the true toll is likely far higher, as DCIP pointed out, “as children continue to suffer from serious communicable and preventable conditions like hypothermia, malnutrition, dehydration, and scabies.”
Entire Families Wiped Out as Israel Resumes Genocidal Assault on Gaza
"All of this is made possible by the U.S. government, which has funded and fueled these atrocities," said Jewish Voice for Peace.
The shrouded bodies of victims of renewed Israeli aistrikes on Gaza are seen outside Al Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Palestine on March 18, 2025.
(Photo: Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images)
"We were shocked late at night to see strikes and attacks on Gaza like in the early days of the war," Momen Qoreiqeh, who lost more than two dozen relatives in an Israeli airstrike on their Gaza City home, toldAl Jazeera. "I was with my family and suddenly there was a huge attack on our residential block. The attack killed so many people from my family, some of them we still haven't recovered from under the rubble."
"So far we've managed to recover about 26 bodies from my family and 20 other people who were with us," he added.
Ramy Abdu, founder and chair of the Geneva-based Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor—which has published numerous reports on alleged Israeli war crimes and acts of genocide in Gaza—said his sister's family was killed in an Israeli strike on their home in Gaza City.
"This morning, Israel killed my sister, my heart, Nesreen, and her beloved sons and daughters: Ubaida, Omar, and Lian, along with Ubaida's wife, Malak, and their children, Siwar and Mohammed," Abdu said on social media.
According to Al Jazeera, the family had survived many Israeli airstrikes over the years.
"Israel may kill us at will, burn us alive, and tear us apart, but it will never succeed in uprooting us from our land," Abdu wrote in a separate post. "Justice and accountability await—no matter how long it takes."
Al Jazeera also reported that Dr. Majda Abu Aker, an OB-GYN at a Rafah clinic run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, and more than a dozen other people were killed in a strike on her house in Rafah's al-Jenaina neighborhood. At least 10 of the dead were from the same family; the youngest victim was a girl who was just three days old.
Fifteen people, most of them members of the Barhoum family, were reportedly killed when Israeli forces bombed al-Mawasi.
Six members of the same family were also reportedly killed while trying to flee in a car in Abasan, east of Khan Younis.
Ahmed Abu Rizq, a teacher who survived Tuesday's airstrikes, described to Al Jazeera the horror and chaos he witnessed at a local hospital, where he saw "blood everywhere" and arriving families carrying the "remains of their children."
Al-Shifa Hospital director Muhammad Abu Salmiya said that "every minute, a wounded person dies due to a lack of resources," as Israel has imposed a " complete siege" on Gaza since October 2023 that has been blamed for widespread starvation and sickness. The South Africa-led genocide case against Israel currently before the International Court of Justice cites the siege, which has been called a "genocidal act" by an independent United Nations commission and human rights groups.
Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, said later in the day that Tuesday's strikes are "only the beginning" and will continue until Hamas frees all the remaining hostages it took on October 7, 2023 and is destroyed.
During a meeting with the U.S. Zionist lobby group American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Jerusalem, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar affirmed that Tuesday's bombings were not a "one-day attack."
Palestine defenders around the world took to the streets to protest the renewed Israeli onslaught. In London, thousands of demonstrators turned out for an emergency protest organized by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Protests also took place in cities including Ramallah, Dublin, Berlin, Jerusalem, Manchester, and Belfast, and are planned for Washington, D.C., Chicago, New York, and elsewhere.
United Nations officials condemned Tuesday's strikes, with U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres writing: "I am outraged by the Israeli airstrikes in Gaza. I strongly appeal for the cease-fire to be respected, for unimpeded humanitarian assistance to be reestablished, and for the remaining hostages to be released unconditionally."
Human rights groups also condemned Israel's renewed aggression, with Amnesty International secretary general Agnès Callamard calling Tuesday "a desperately dark day for humanity."
"Israel brazenly resumed its devastating bombing campaign in Gaza... again wiping out entire families in a matter of hours," she said. "Palestinians in Gaza—who have barely had a chance to start piecing together their lives and continue to grapple with the trauma of Israel's past attacks—have woken up once more to the hellish nightmare of intense bombardment."
"Today, we are back to square one," Callamard lamented. "Since March 2, Israel has reimposed a total siege on Gaza blocking the entry of all humanitarian aid, medicine, and commercial supplies, including fuel and food, in flagrant violation of international law. Israel has also cut off electricity to Gaza's main operational desalination plant. And today the Israeli military has once again started issuing mass 'evacuation' orders displacing Palestinians."
Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch's Israel and Palestine director, said: "The reported killings of hundreds of Palestinians amid Israel's renewed assault on Gaza is alarming. The Israeli authorities have committed war crimes, crimes against humanity, including forced displacement and extermination, and acts of genocide during the assault on Gaza."
"Other countries should urgently act to prevent further mass atrocities, including by suspending arms transfers to Israel, supporting the International Criminal Court and executing its arrest warrants, and imposing targeted sanctions on officials responsible for laws-of-war violations," Shakir added.
The American Human Rights Council (AHRC) condemned "the restart of the Israeli genocidal policy of starving and bombing the Palestinians in Gaza" and noted that "the victims of the Israeli genocidal acts are primarily infants, children, women, and the elderly."
"AHRC urges the Trump administration to uphold its peace promise," the group added. "The current Israeli escalation of war crimes and the ongoing Israeli weaponization of food, water, and medicine are resulting in avoidable deaths and suffering. The U.S. can put a permanent end to this war but for political expediency is choosing not to."
Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the largest U.S. Muslim civil rights group, said that "President Trump must stop the madness after the government of indicted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu renewed its genocide and slaughtered hundreds of Palestinians, including women and children, during the holy month of Ramadan."
"Without strong actions to push back against this renewed orgy of slaughter, mass destruction, forced starvation, and ethnic cleansing, the Israeli government will continue to act with impunity and our government will remain as complicit with genocide as it was under the Biden administration," Awad added.
The U.S. group Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)—which has organized numerous protests against the assault on Gaza—said: "This is a campaign of extermination. This is genocide."
"All of this is made possible by the U.S. government, which has funded and fueled these atrocities," JVP noted. "Over the last 17 months, the U.S. has spent over $17 billion in military funding to the Israeli government's campaign of extermination and apartheid against the Palestinian people, and continues to sell the Israeli military more weapons."
The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)—a Quaker organization that has worked in Palestine for decades—said that "there are no words adequate to express the devastation of watching bombs rain down again on people who have already endured more than 17 months of a U.S.-backed genocide."
"Our hearts are with AFSC staff, families, partners, friends, and all Palestinians in Gaza—we are holding you in the Light and we will continue the relentless struggle to end these atrocities," the group added.
Progressive U.S. lawmakers also denounced the renewed Israeli assault and demanded an end to American armed aid, with Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the only Palestinian American member of Congress, writing on social media that "the Israeli apartheid regime has resumed its genocide, carrying out airstrikes all across Gaza and killing hundreds of Palestinians."
"This comes after a complete blockade of food, electricity, and aid," Tlaib added. "They will never stop until there are sanctions and an arms embargo."
The Gaza Health Ministry says that at least 48,964 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces over the past 529 days. At least 112,481 others have been wounded, and an estimated 14,000 more are missing and believed dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings.
"All of this is made possible by the U.S. government, which has funded and fueled these atrocities," said Jewish Voice for Peace.
The shrouded bodies of victims of renewed Israeli aistrikes on Gaza are seen outside Al Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Palestine on March 18, 2025.
(Photo: Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Brett Wilkins
Mar 18, 2025
COMMON DREAMS
Once again, entire families are being wiped out by Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip after U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly gave the green light for the key American ally to resume its assault on the Palestinian enclave.
Israel unilaterally abrogated the crumbling eight-week cease-fire early Tuesday, unleashing a wave of ferocious strikes on the already flattened Gaza Strip, killing at least 404 people—including 174 children, 89 women, and 32 elders—and wounding at least 562 others, with the death toll expected to rise, according to the Gaza Health Ministry
Mar 18, 2025
COMMON DREAMS
Once again, entire families are being wiped out by Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip after U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly gave the green light for the key American ally to resume its assault on the Palestinian enclave.
Israel unilaterally abrogated the crumbling eight-week cease-fire early Tuesday, unleashing a wave of ferocious strikes on the already flattened Gaza Strip, killing at least 404 people—including 174 children, 89 women, and 32 elders—and wounding at least 562 others, with the death toll expected to rise, according to the Gaza Health Ministry
.
"We were shocked late at night to see strikes and attacks on Gaza like in the early days of the war," Momen Qoreiqeh, who lost more than two dozen relatives in an Israeli airstrike on their Gaza City home, toldAl Jazeera. "I was with my family and suddenly there was a huge attack on our residential block. The attack killed so many people from my family, some of them we still haven't recovered from under the rubble."
"So far we've managed to recover about 26 bodies from my family and 20 other people who were with us," he added.
Ramy Abdu, founder and chair of the Geneva-based Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor—which has published numerous reports on alleged Israeli war crimes and acts of genocide in Gaza—said his sister's family was killed in an Israeli strike on their home in Gaza City.
"This morning, Israel killed my sister, my heart, Nesreen, and her beloved sons and daughters: Ubaida, Omar, and Lian, along with Ubaida's wife, Malak, and their children, Siwar and Mohammed," Abdu said on social media.
According to Al Jazeera, the family had survived many Israeli airstrikes over the years.
"Israel may kill us at will, burn us alive, and tear us apart, but it will never succeed in uprooting us from our land," Abdu wrote in a separate post. "Justice and accountability await—no matter how long it takes."
Al Jazeera also reported that Dr. Majda Abu Aker, an OB-GYN at a Rafah clinic run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, and more than a dozen other people were killed in a strike on her house in Rafah's al-Jenaina neighborhood. At least 10 of the dead were from the same family; the youngest victim was a girl who was just three days old.
Fifteen people, most of them members of the Barhoum family, were reportedly killed when Israeli forces bombed al-Mawasi.
Six members of the same family were also reportedly killed while trying to flee in a car in Abasan, east of Khan Younis.
Ahmed Abu Rizq, a teacher who survived Tuesday's airstrikes, described to Al Jazeera the horror and chaos he witnessed at a local hospital, where he saw "blood everywhere" and arriving families carrying the "remains of their children."
Al-Shifa Hospital director Muhammad Abu Salmiya said that "every minute, a wounded person dies due to a lack of resources," as Israel has imposed a " complete siege" on Gaza since October 2023 that has been blamed for widespread starvation and sickness. The South Africa-led genocide case against Israel currently before the International Court of Justice cites the siege, which has been called a "genocidal act" by an independent United Nations commission and human rights groups.
Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, said later in the day that Tuesday's strikes are "only the beginning" and will continue until Hamas frees all the remaining hostages it took on October 7, 2023 and is destroyed.
During a meeting with the U.S. Zionist lobby group American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Jerusalem, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar affirmed that Tuesday's bombings were not a "one-day attack."
Palestine defenders around the world took to the streets to protest the renewed Israeli onslaught. In London, thousands of demonstrators turned out for an emergency protest organized by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Protests also took place in cities including Ramallah, Dublin, Berlin, Jerusalem, Manchester, and Belfast, and are planned for Washington, D.C., Chicago, New York, and elsewhere.
United Nations officials condemned Tuesday's strikes, with U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres writing: "I am outraged by the Israeli airstrikes in Gaza. I strongly appeal for the cease-fire to be respected, for unimpeded humanitarian assistance to be reestablished, and for the remaining hostages to be released unconditionally."
Human rights groups also condemned Israel's renewed aggression, with Amnesty International secretary general Agnès Callamard calling Tuesday "a desperately dark day for humanity."
"Israel brazenly resumed its devastating bombing campaign in Gaza... again wiping out entire families in a matter of hours," she said. "Palestinians in Gaza—who have barely had a chance to start piecing together their lives and continue to grapple with the trauma of Israel's past attacks—have woken up once more to the hellish nightmare of intense bombardment."
"Today, we are back to square one," Callamard lamented. "Since March 2, Israel has reimposed a total siege on Gaza blocking the entry of all humanitarian aid, medicine, and commercial supplies, including fuel and food, in flagrant violation of international law. Israel has also cut off electricity to Gaza's main operational desalination plant. And today the Israeli military has once again started issuing mass 'evacuation' orders displacing Palestinians."
Omar Shakir, Human Rights Watch's Israel and Palestine director, said: "The reported killings of hundreds of Palestinians amid Israel's renewed assault on Gaza is alarming. The Israeli authorities have committed war crimes, crimes against humanity, including forced displacement and extermination, and acts of genocide during the assault on Gaza."
"Other countries should urgently act to prevent further mass atrocities, including by suspending arms transfers to Israel, supporting the International Criminal Court and executing its arrest warrants, and imposing targeted sanctions on officials responsible for laws-of-war violations," Shakir added.
The American Human Rights Council (AHRC) condemned "the restart of the Israeli genocidal policy of starving and bombing the Palestinians in Gaza" and noted that "the victims of the Israeli genocidal acts are primarily infants, children, women, and the elderly."
"AHRC urges the Trump administration to uphold its peace promise," the group added. "The current Israeli escalation of war crimes and the ongoing Israeli weaponization of food, water, and medicine are resulting in avoidable deaths and suffering. The U.S. can put a permanent end to this war but for political expediency is choosing not to."
Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the largest U.S. Muslim civil rights group, said that "President Trump must stop the madness after the government of indicted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu renewed its genocide and slaughtered hundreds of Palestinians, including women and children, during the holy month of Ramadan."
"Without strong actions to push back against this renewed orgy of slaughter, mass destruction, forced starvation, and ethnic cleansing, the Israeli government will continue to act with impunity and our government will remain as complicit with genocide as it was under the Biden administration," Awad added.
The U.S. group Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)—which has organized numerous protests against the assault on Gaza—said: "This is a campaign of extermination. This is genocide."
"All of this is made possible by the U.S. government, which has funded and fueled these atrocities," JVP noted. "Over the last 17 months, the U.S. has spent over $17 billion in military funding to the Israeli government's campaign of extermination and apartheid against the Palestinian people, and continues to sell the Israeli military more weapons."
The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)—a Quaker organization that has worked in Palestine for decades—said that "there are no words adequate to express the devastation of watching bombs rain down again on people who have already endured more than 17 months of a U.S.-backed genocide."
"Our hearts are with AFSC staff, families, partners, friends, and all Palestinians in Gaza—we are holding you in the Light and we will continue the relentless struggle to end these atrocities," the group added.
Progressive U.S. lawmakers also denounced the renewed Israeli assault and demanded an end to American armed aid, with Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the only Palestinian American member of Congress, writing on social media that "the Israeli apartheid regime has resumed its genocide, carrying out airstrikes all across Gaza and killing hundreds of Palestinians."
"This comes after a complete blockade of food, electricity, and aid," Tlaib added. "They will never stop until there are sanctions and an arms embargo."
The Gaza Health Ministry says that at least 48,964 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces over the past 529 days. At least 112,481 others have been wounded, and an estimated 14,000 more are missing and believed dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings.
The ceasefire was still difficult, but we believed we would wake up alive. Now, Israel has taken even that away from us.
By Dalia Abu Ramadan ,
March 18, 2025
People search for survivors in the rubble of a building destroyed in an overnight Israeli military strike in Jabaliya, in the northern Gaza Strip on March 18, 2025.
Bashar Taleb / AFP via Getty Images
I was jolted awake at 2 am this morning by the deafening sound of explosions and relentless bombardment here in the Rimal neighborhood in Gaza where I live. The noise was so overwhelming, I couldn’t tell where it was coming from.
I was in a deep sleep, as I am every night, worn out by the constant anguish we live through. There is no life for us — only survival in the temporary silence of a ceasefire.
During the ceasefire we still struggled to eat, to keep breathing, to find shelter. At least we could rest for a moment, believing we might wake up alive, not to the sound of missiles and blasts. But then, something changed. What happened?
During the 2 am bombardment, the earth itself seemed to shake under the force of each blast. Fear gripped my heart, and my family and I scrambled to make sense of the chaos. What was happening? We were paralyzed by the shock, as if we were reliving the horror of war all over again. We couldn’t believe it. Had the war truly returned?
In disbelief, we reached out to friends and turned on the news, desperate for answers. The response was clear — yes, the Israeli military’s airstrikes had resumed, raining down across Gaza from north to south. Death has returned like a shadow that followed us. Today is not October 7, but this is the same nightmare in a different moment, a different hour, a different year. New questions haunt us: Will this nightmare stretch beyond a year, like the war did before this broken ceasefire, or will we be consumed from the very beginning? Will this Ramadan mirror the one we barely survived? Will it bring more sorrow, more despair, as we find ourselves trapped in a cycle that refuses to end?
I was jolted awake at 2 am this morning by the deafening sound of explosions and relentless bombardment here in the Rimal neighborhood in Gaza where I live. The noise was so overwhelming, I couldn’t tell where it was coming from.
I was in a deep sleep, as I am every night, worn out by the constant anguish we live through. There is no life for us — only survival in the temporary silence of a ceasefire.
During the ceasefire we still struggled to eat, to keep breathing, to find shelter. At least we could rest for a moment, believing we might wake up alive, not to the sound of missiles and blasts. But then, something changed. What happened?
During the 2 am bombardment, the earth itself seemed to shake under the force of each blast. Fear gripped my heart, and my family and I scrambled to make sense of the chaos. What was happening? We were paralyzed by the shock, as if we were reliving the horror of war all over again. We couldn’t believe it. Had the war truly returned?
In disbelief, we reached out to friends and turned on the news, desperate for answers. The response was clear — yes, the Israeli military’s airstrikes had resumed, raining down across Gaza from north to south. Death has returned like a shadow that followed us. Today is not October 7, but this is the same nightmare in a different moment, a different hour, a different year. New questions haunt us: Will this nightmare stretch beyond a year, like the war did before this broken ceasefire, or will we be consumed from the very beginning? Will this Ramadan mirror the one we barely survived? Will it bring more sorrow, more despair, as we find ourselves trapped in a cycle that refuses to end?
In the midst of these terrifying moments, my mind drifts back to the previous Ramadan. How we lived each day as if it were our last, constantly bracing ourselves for the worst.
Despite the temporary nature of the recent ceasefire and the grim conditions of destruction, blockade and famine, this year I had a glimmer of hope. Now, with the brutal return of genocide, my feelings of despair have deepened.
Even before last night’s bombardment, parts of the Rimal neighborhood of Gaza were already reduced to rubble. The author took this photo on March 17, 2025, before the latest bombings.Dalia Abu RamadanI wonder: Where will I escape this time? Who will I lose? Will I ever get to graduate with my bachelor’s degree in English translation from the Islamic University of Gaza? The war and siege have delayed my graduation, but I’ve never stopped learning or writing, even as everything has been postponed because of the war. Even as I write these words, the sound of explosions reverberates, amplifying my anxiety and fear.
I turned 22 during the war, on February 9, 2024, and turned 23 last month during the ceasefire. Unfortunately, with every passing year, I feel like I’m living a tragedy. How many more years will we grow older while only surviving Israel’s wars on us? With every year that adds another number to my age, I remember the wars I’ve lived through, enduring both Ramadan and Eid under the shadow of destruction.
Even as I write these words, the sound of explosions reverberates, amplifying my anxiety and fear.
The war that I survived in 2014 lasted for 51 days. I was just 12 years old, but I was fully aware that we were living through genocide. The Israeli military completely destroyed the Shujayea neighborhood of Gaza. In 2018 and 2019, many other escalations occurred, and the security situation in Gaza was unstable, especially along the borders, where many innocent people were killed, including protesters demanding an end to Israel’s blockade and the right to return to their ancestral homes.
Then, in 2021, as I was preparing for my university exams, the Israeli military rained destruction on Gaza for 11 days. It was one of the hardest wars I’ve lived through: Israel deployed weapons it had never used before. That war also marked the beginning of the use of “fire belts,” an Israeli tactic in which a warplane pummels a single location with many missiles. The war reached its peak during Eid al-Fitr, and it was a terrifying time, especially since I had become more aware of the horrors around me.
I remember how my friend Zainab Al-Qouluq, who lived on al-Wehda street in the Rimal neighborhood, lost her mother, her sisters and also her brother. Her story was heartbreaking. On that same street where she lived, the Abu Al-Awf family was struck by a fire belt, and some of its members were killed. That war ended, but little did we know, the worst was yet to come.
In the October 7 war, the Israeli military’s use of fire belts advanced to the point where an entire neighborhood could be wiped out. The war was not confined to just one area; it was a war across all of Gaza. In 2024, we also lived through Ramadan and Eid in the middle of war. I remember desperately needing to leave the house on the first day of Eid.
As I walked down the street in my neighborhood, I saw a house completely demolished with a message written in black pen on its wall: “I know you can hear me, wishing you all the best every year.”
I asked some neighbors who hadn’t evacuated about it, and they told me that a young man had lost his entire family, and they were still buried under the rubble. He wrote that message because he was completely alone.
I had hoped we’d make it through Ramadan in relative peace, under the fragile ceasefire. But it has become painfully clear — this nightmare from October 7, which had never truly ended, has returned with its full force. The terror, the destruction, the uncertainty… it’s back, relentless and unforgiving. The war has come back, stronger than before. It erupted again at 2 am, and by morning the Israeli military had murdered more than 400 people in Gaza, including many children. In those terrible hours, lives were shattered, futures obliterated — an unimaginable horror unfolding once again. The numbers, the loss — it’s more than any soul can endure!
We haven’t even begun to recover from all of the wars that came before. Many, like Zainab, have been left shattered, their lives forever altered. And then there are those families — at least 1,200 of them — who have been erased entirely, wiped off the map, their names no longer etched in history. Not a single soul remains. Today, on March 18, the Zain al-Din family was erased too — destroyed with the return of the genocide, as the nightmare continues to claim everything in its path.
We held onto the hope that the ceasefire would last, desperate for a moment of peace — a chance to wake up to calm, despite the internal struggles and the obstacles we face as a result of this war. But how much longer must we live through this endless cycle of violence? How many more years will we carry the weight of this war on our shoulders?
Will Gaza ever know peace, or will refuge from endless war only echo in the stillness of death?
This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license.
Dalia Abu Ramadan is a Palestinian storyteller and aspiring graduate of the Islamic University of Gaza, sharing powerful narratives that reflect the strength, resilience, and challenges of life in Gaza.
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