Updated on March 18, 2025, at 7:59 am EST
The Israeli military on Tuesday morning began launching large-scale airstrikes on the besieged Gaza Strip, marking the full-scale resumption of Israel’s genocidal war.
Around 1:00 pm Gaza time, Al Jazeera reported that 404 Palestinians had been killed and 562 had been wounded by Israeli strikes on homes and tents sheltering displaced Palestinians across the Strip.
Pictures and videos from Gaza that have surfaced online show there is a large number of child casualties. “Israeli bombardment has returned to Gaza, bringing massacres with it once again,” Al Jazeera reporter Anas al-Sharif wrote on X. “The bodies of children, killed in their sleep, lay scattered in the aftermath.”
The massive attack came about two weeks after Israel imposed a total blockade on aid and all other goods entering Gaza at the end of the first phase of the ceasefire deal. Israel violated the agreement by imposing the blockade, refusing to engage in negotiations on the second phase, and killing Palestinians throughout the truce.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement Tuesday morning that he instructed the Israeli military to escalate in Gaza in response to Hamas rejecting US and Israeli terms for an extended temporary ceasefire. Hamas wanted Israel to stick to the deal it agreed to in January, which would have involved a permanent truce and full Israeli withdrawal.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz have instructed the IDF to take strong action against the Hamas terrorist organization in the Gaza Strip,” Netanyahu’s office said. “This follows Hamas’s 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.”
The statement added that Israel will “from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength. The operational plan was presented by the IDF over the weekend and approved by the political leadership.”
Hamas told Reuters that Israel had chosen to end the ceasefire unilaterally and that Israel’s attacks expose the remaining Israeli hostages to an “unknown fate.”
The White House confirmed that President Trump was notified before Israel launched the massive bombing. “The Trump administration and the White House were consulted by the Israelis on their attacks in Gaza tonight,” said White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.
Leavitt repeated Trump’s threat that “all hell would break loose” in Gaza. Trump previously threatened that the “people of Gaza” would be “dead” if the hostages weren’t immediately freed.
Since President Trump came into office, he has provided a massive amount of military aid to Israel, approving over $12 billion in arms deals and supplying Israel with 2,000-pound bombs. The Trump administration did not pressure Israel to implement the ceasefire deal reached in January.
