Israeli strike kills senior rescue service official in Gaza as fighting rages

An Israeli airstrike on a house in Jabalia on Sunday killed Mohammad Morsi, deputy director of the Gaza Civil Emergency Service in the northern areas of the Gaza Strip, and four of his family, health officials said.

The Civil Emergency Service said in a statement that Morsi's death raised to 83 the number of its members killed by Israeli fire since October 7.

There was no immediate Israeli comment on Morsi's death.

Residents said Israeli forces had also blown up several houses in the Zeitoun suburb of Gaza City, 5km from Jabalia. Medical teams said they were unable to answer desperate calls by some of the residents who had reported being trapped inside their houses, some wounded.

"We hear constant bombing in Zeitoun, we know they are blowing up houses there, we don't sleep because of the sounds of explosions, the roaring of tanks sound close and the drones don't stop circling," said one resident of Gaza City, who lives around 1 km away.

"The occupation is wiping out Zeitoun, we are afraid about the people trapped in there," he told Reuters via a chat app, refusing to be named.

Israel and Hamas continued to blame one another for the failure of mediators, including Qatar, Egypt and the US, to broker a ceasefire. The US is preparing to present a new proposal, but the prospects of a breakthrough appear dim as gaps between the sides' positions remain large.

Meanwhile on Sunday the United Nations, in collaboration with local health authorities, extended by a day a campaign to vaccinate children in the southern Gaza Strip against polio before it moves on Monday to the north.

Israel, which has lost 340 soldiers in Gaza, says at least a third of the Palestinian dead are fighters.