ANKARA

At least 96 Palestinians were killed and 60 others injured in Israeli airstrikes in the northern and central Gaza Strip on Sunday, according to local authorities.

Gaza’s government media office said Israeli warplanes targeted several residential buildings and homes in the northern town of Beit Lahia and the refugee camps of Nuseirat and Bureij in central Gaza.

A statement released by the office said that more than 72 people lost their lives in the attacks in Beit Lahia, while 24 other Palestinians were killed and 60 others injured in central Gaza.

"The occupation army was aware that dozens of displaced civilians were inside these buildings, and that the majority of them were children and women who had been displaced from their neighborhoods,” it added.

It called on the international community to denounce “these horrific massacres against displaced civilians" and demanded accountability for “the Israeli government and its international backers, including the US, the UK, Germany, and France.”

A medical source earlier told Anadolu that Israeli fighter jets hit a five-story building in the Beit Lahia Project area on Sunday, killing about 50 people and leaving several others trapped under the rubble.

Witnesses said that over 70 displaced civilians had sheltered inside the targeted building.

An Israeli strike targeted another house in the area, killing 15 people and injuring several others, another medical source said.

Two more Palestinians were killed when Israeli warplanes struck another residence in Beit Lahia, the source added.

Since Oct. 5, Israel has launched a large-scale ground operation in northern Gaza to allegedly prevent Palestinian resistance group Hamas from regrouping. Palestinians, however, accuse Israel of seeking to occupy the area and forcibly displace its residents.

Since then, no humanitarian aid, including food, medicine, and fuel, was allowed into the area, leaving most of the population there on the verge of imminent famine.

More than 2,000 people have since been killed, according to Palestinian health authorities.

The onslaught was the latest episode in a brutal Israeli war on the Gaza Strip since October last year, despite a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire.

Nearly 43,800 people have since been killed in Gaza, mostly women and children, and over 103,600 others injured, according to Palestinian health authorities.

Israel faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its deadly war on Gaza.

*Writing by Ikram Kouachi