Israel-Palestine war: Gaza suffers most air strikes in a month in Middle East since 2020

The Gaza Strip has experienced the highest number of air strikes recorded within a single month for any country or territory in the Middle East going back to 2020, according to a data analytics firm tracking Israel’s assault.

“The scale of Israel’s air campaign in Gaza is unprecedented,” the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (Acled) said in a post on the social media platform X.

Acled recorded more than 600 air strike events across more than 50 locations in Gaza in October alone.

“Despite Gaza’s small size of just 360 square kilometers, this represents the highest number of air strike events recorded within a single month for any country or territory in the Middle East since 2020,” the group said.

Israel began its latest air campaign on the besieged enclave after the Hamas-led 7 October attacks killed about 1,400 Israelis, mainly civilians, with around 240 hostages being seized.

More than 10,300 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli bombardment over the past month, including over 4,000 children.

The relentless Israeli bombing campaign has flattened entire neighbourhoods and targeted civilian infrastructure, hospitals, mosques, churches and schools sheltering thousands of displaced people.

The update from Acled is just the latest statistic to capture the unprecedented bloodshed being experienced by Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip.

According to the Palestinian health ministry, on average, a Palestinian child was killed every 10 minutes over the past month.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has repeatedly called for an immediate ceasefire, and on Monday warned that the Gaza Strip was becoming a “graveyard for children”.

On Tuesday, the Israeli military killed "dozens" of civilians in central Gaza's Deir al-Balah in what the Palestinian health ministry described as a "new massacre".

Israel refuses to rule out ground attack on hospital 

Israel has rejected appeals from the international community, and its Arab neighbours, for a ceasefire.

The war has now entered a phase of ground combat, with Israeli forces fighting in the "heart of Gaza City" according to the Israeli military.

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Tuesday that Israel was "tightening the stranglehold" around Gaza City as he refused to rule out Israel invading the city’s Al-Shifa hospital, claiming that it housed a Hamas command centre.

Hamas has denied those allegations. 

Other medical facilities have also pushed back against similar Israeli claims.

Indonesia denied on Monday that its hospital built with charitable funds in the Gaza Strip was constructed atop a network of Hamas tunnels.