By Cindy Riechau, Emad Drimly and Miriam Widman dpa
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TEL AVIV, Israel — The UN high commissioner for human rights, Volker Turk, on Friday condemned Israel’s latest strikes in the Gaza Strip, warning of the possibility of “ethnic cleansing.”

“This latest barrage of bombs, forcing people to move amid the threat of intensified attacks, the methodical destruction of entire neighborhoods, and the denial of humanitarian assistance underline that there appears to be a push for a permanent demographic shift in Gaza,” Turk said.

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He stressed that this would be “in defiance of international law and is tantamount to ethnic cleansing.”

“We must stop the clock on this madness,” Turk added. He emphasized that the parties to the conflict must comply with the international convention on the prevention and punishment of genocide.

“Those who do not must be held to account,” he said.

Over 100 dead after latest wave of Israeli strikes

Turk’s comments came after the Palestinian news agency WAFA reported that at least 100 people had been killed in the northern Gaza Strip following multiple Israeli airstrikes since Thursday evening.

The Hamas-controlled health authority said 93 people had been killed and more than 200 injured.

The figures do not distinguish between civilian and military casualties and cannot be independently verified.

Israel says it hit ‘terror targets’

Israel on Friday said its air force “struck over 150 terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip including anti-tank missile posts, terrorist cells, military structures” and centers it said “terrorists” were using to carry out attacks against its troops.

The Israel Defense Forces, on their Telegram channel, said they had “eliminated several terrorists who were operating in an observation compound” in northern Gaza and has also dismantled “terrorist infrastructure” in southern Gaza.

The IDF information could also not be independently verified.

WAFA reported that more than 10 houses were hit in the city of Beit Lahia and the Jabalia refugee district. It said that Israel used war planes, helicopters, drones and naval vessels in the attack.

Ambulances are currently unable to reach the area due to destroyed roads, it added. On social media footage circulated purportedly showing images of the attacks’ victims.

Israel’s military stated, upon request, that it was investigating the report.

Plans to expand Gaza operations

The Israeli news site ynet, citing security officials, reported that the massive attacks in recent days were preparation for the deployment of additional troops.

The Israeli government recently announced plans to expand its operations in the Gaza Strip.

UN calls for resumption of aid deliveries to Gaza

Global civil society must push for the resumption of aid deliveries to the Gaza Strip, given that the current situation is “so grotesquely abnormal,” the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Friday.

“The situation as it has developed now is so grotesquely abnormal that some popular pressure on leaders around the world needs to happen,” OCHA spokesman Jens Laerke said in Geneva.

Israel’s military has not allowed aid deliveries into the Gaza Strip for more than two months. The Israeli armed forces accuse the Palestinian extremist organization Hamas of reselling aid supplies to the increasingly suffering population to fund fighters and weapons.

OCHA spokesman Laerke said the organization has implemented robust security measures to prevent such misuse, although the diversion of small amounts can never be completely ruled out. The UN has previously demonstrated its ability to assist people in the Gaza Strip effectively, he said.

Laerke criticized a humanitarian aid plan, supported by Israel and the United States, via the newly established Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which would provide aid.

He said the GHF is vastly underfunded and his organization has not received any information about potential cooperation with it.

“But we think it is a bad plan in any case, so we are not going to participate in it.”

Israeli policeman attacked in Jerusalem

A man armed with a knife injured an Israeli policeman in the Old City of Jerusalem, police reports said on Friday.

Other members of the security forces shot at the attacker, the police stated. The man was killed in the process.

The injured 25-year-old policeman was taken to hospital.

The attacker reportedly left a mosque in the Old City and then attacked the policeman during a check, Israeli media reported.

Israel attacks Houthi targets in Yemen

The Israeli Air Force also said on Friday that it had attacked several positions of the Hamas-allied Houthi militia in the Yemeni ports of Hodeidah and Salif.

There were no initial reports of casualties.

The Israeli military said the two ports were being used for terrorist activities and that weapons had been transported via them in the past.

Since the start of the Gaza war, the Houthis have regularly attacked Israel with rockets and drones in solidarity with Hamas. In recent days, sirens have sounded in various regions of Israel.

Israel last launched attacks in Yemen about 10 days ago.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz on Friday threatened attacks on Houthi leaders. “If the Houthis continue to fire rockets at the State of Israel, they will suffer painful blows,” Katz wrote on X.

He warned the Houthi leaders faced the same fate as the leaders of Hamas and the Lebanese Hezbollah militia, who were killed in Israeli strikes.