OCCUPIED TERRITORIES: ISRAELI WAR CRIMES

UN News Center: Homes of 1,100 Palestinians in Gaza destroyed in first 10 days of May - UN Agency

The last 10 days have seen one of the most intense periods of destruction by the Israeli military in Gaza since the start of the Intifada, with more than 100 homes flattened and 1,100 people left homeless, the main United Nations agency helping Palestinian refugees said today.

According to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), the Israeli military has demolished or damaged beyond repair 131 residential buildings since the start of May, bringing to 17,594 the total number of people who have lost their homes in Gaza.

The majority of the demolitions have taken place in Rafah in the south, where 11,215 people have already been made homeless by demolitions since the beginning of the current strife in September 2000, and in the region of the Kissufim Road, where a Palestinian attack on 2 May left an Israeli mother and her four children dead.