ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - At least 330 people, including children were killed on Tuesday in a massive Israeli campaign throughout Gaza - the most intense and deadliest strikes since a ceasefire.
"The health ministry has recorded more than 330 deaths, most of them Palestinian women and children, and hundreds of wounded, dozens of them in critical condition," according to the Gaza health ministry.
Tel Aviv warned on Tuesday that they will continue fighting in Gaza unless all the remaining hostages under Hamas’s captivity are released.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said the operation was ordered after "Hamas' repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from US Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators.
"Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength," said the statement.
Hamas warned the Israeli government that the return to fighting could be a "death sentence" for hostages still alive in Gaza.
"Netanyahu's decision to resume war is a decision to sacrifice the occupation's prisoners and impose a death sentence on them,” Hamas said.
The first phase of a ceasefire that took effect on January 19, mediated by Qatar, Egypt, and the United States, expired in early March, halting more than 15 months of fighting in Gaza.
The first phase of the truce saw the release of 33 hostages by Hamas and around 1,800 Palestinian prisoners by Israel.
A second phase of that deal was supposed to secure the release of dozens of hostages still in Gaza and pave the way for a more permanent end to the war, but both sides reached a deadlock, unable to agree on the next steps for ceasefire talks.
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