Israel’s Renewed Attack Amidst Ceasefire Kills 25 Palestinians In Gaza.

Gaza City/Khan Younis; January 2026: Today, 31st January 2026, around 11:30IST, Israeli Army has killed 25 Palestinians including 06 children despite a ceasefire in force since October 2025, and targeted shelters for the displaced.

The attacks on Gaza City and Khan Younis had begun since Friday late evening while continuing till the dawn today, and comes just a day before Israel is set to open the Rafah crossing for the first time since May 2024. The latest attacks have taken the toll of those killed by Israel in Gaza since the ceasefire to over 525. An additional 1,360 others have been wounded by Israeli attacks in the same period.

Gaza’s government media office said the Israeli army had carried out “grave and systematic violations of the ceasefire over the past 111 days, which constitutes a blatant breach of international humanitarian law and a deliberate undermining of the essence of the truce”. The office added that at least 50 Palestinians have also been detained since the truce, all of whom were far from the so-called yellow line demarcating the Israeli area of control.

Israeli warplanes also renewed their airstrikes on the al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis, the Palestinian Wafa news agency reported.

Hamas have slammed the recent attacks, calling them a “dangerous escalation and a deliberate undermining of the ceasefire agreement. The ongoing bombardment of the Gaza Strip by the Israeli occupation, alongwith the rise in the number of martyrs in various areas of the Gaza Strip in recent hours to 12, including 06 children, represent a brutal crime and a renewed and blatant violation of the ceasefire agreement”, the group said.

Israel’s war on Gaza, determined to be a genocide by leading rights groups and UN experts, has killed at least 71,769 people since October 2023.

According to Israeli media, only sick and wounded Palestinians will be allowed to exit Gaza through the Rafah crossing. An Israeli security official said that between 150 and 200 entry-exits are expected daily. The Israeli occupation’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) said those who enter the enclave will have to have prior security authorisation from Israel.

Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, Israeli settlers set fire to a home in the Bedouin community of Jaba, located southeast of Ramallah. Footage from Friday evening shows settlers approaching the Palestinian community after dark and setting the building on fire. Local residents said around 20 settlers gathered in the night from the nearby Gur Aryeh illegal outpost, and forced the Palestinian residents to evacuate.

Israeli forces also arrested 13 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, including a young girl.

A Palestinian prisoner’s group, ASRA, said on Saturday 02 were arrested in Jenin after Israeli forces stormed the Jabal Abu Dhahir area of the city. Israeli forces also carried out a raid on the Qalqilya governorate. Elsewhere, Israeli forces closed the Bab al-Zawiya area in Hebron, forcing shops to close and residents to leave the area.

Meanwhile, as a matter of severe regression, South Africa has declared Israel’s top diplomat in the country “persona non grata” and has given him 72 hours to leave, the foreign ministry said on Friday (30th January 2026) citing a “series of violations”.

Ties between the two nations are already strained, with South Africa bringing a case before the United Nations top court in 2023 to argue that Israel’s war on Gaza, an illegally occupied Palestinian territory, amounted to genocide.

The Israeli government had been informed that its charge d’affaires, Ariel Seidman, has been “declared persona non grata” and “required to depart from the Republic within 72 hours”, the ministry said in a statement. “This decisive measure follows a series of unacceptable violations of diplomatic norms and practice which pose a direct challenge to South Africa’s sovereignty”, it said.

They included “the repeated use of official Israeli social media platforms to launch insulting attacks” on President Cyril Ramaphosa. The foreign ministry also accused the embassy of a “deliberate failure” to inform South Africa of “purported visits by senior Israeli officials”.

The Israeli foreign ministry swiftly responded that South Africa’s senior diplomatic representative “is persona non grata and must leave Israel within 72 hours”. In a statement on X, it accused Pretoria of “false attacks against Israel in the international arena” and described Seidman’s expulsion as a “unilateral, baseless step”. He was Israel’s most senior representative in South Africa after Tel Aviv recalled its ambassador in 2023.

Team Maverick.