GAZA CITY (Dispatches) -- Palestinians are refusing to leave their homes after Israel’s military on Friday ordered all civilians in northern Gaza, more than 1 million people, to evacuate to the south of the besieged enclave within 24 hours.
Hamas said it was attacking the army northern division headquarters in northern occupied territories with 250km-range rockets.
Sirens sounded across northern Occupied Palestine, with initial reports of impacts in some areas.
The Zionist army said in a statement on Friday that civilians must leave Gaza City in the north, and that they would not be allowed to return “until we say so” and until “a statement is issued allowing this”.
But many people are refusing to leave their homes, fearing a repeat of the Nakba in 1948, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were expelled from their land, and remain refugees over seven decades later.
Salim Ayoub, a 65-year-old from Gaza, told Middle East Eye that “what is happening now is a repeat of what happened in 1948.
“I sat down and discussed this with my children, and we have decided not to leave. We will not be leaving north Gaza and going to the south because we do not want to be made homeless again,” he added.
Naama Hazem, 20, lives with her family in the Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City.
“We are more than 20 people in the building. My grandfather refuses to go out and says he prefers to die in his house,” she told MEE.
“We made the decision not to separate, even if it means we die together. In fact, even if we thought about leaving, there would be nowhere for us to go. We have no relatives in the south.”
Palestinians from the north of Gaza have already been displaced in recent days by the occupying regime’s ruthless bombing campaign.
Reporters on the ground said that it currently “looks like a second Nakba” and that “many families are now leaving their homes”.
The United Nations called on Israel to call off the evacuation order.
“The United Nations considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences,” said Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for the UN secretary-general.
The World Health Organization has said that Israel forcing severely ill people in Gaza, including those on life support, to move amounts to a “death sentence”.
There is a belief among Palestinians that the order is part of a plan to move its residents southwards, until they are forced to leave Gaza altogether and cross into Egypt as refugees.
On Thursday, Palestinians from Gaza said that plans to open a human corridor for civilians to flee to Egypt’s Sinai region would be akin to a “second Nakba”.
The head of Gaza’s government media office said Israel was “bombing a number of cars that have left Gaza towards the south of the strip.”
More than 700,000 Palestinians were sent into exile in 1948 and they and their descendants have never been allowed back.
Many of those Palestinian families ended up in Gaza and the current order to leave will bring back historic memories of the ethnic cleansing of 1948.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said it is now unable to assist people in their shelters, as they have reached capacity.
“Over 170,000 people are in our shelters that we are no longer able to work in,” a spokesperson told Al Jazeera. “We’re unable to assist them,” she added.
Palestine’s Ministry of Health said that the death toll had reached 1,799 as of 4pm local time Friday, including 583 children and 351 women.
The ministry stated that 7,388 other citizens had been wounded, including 1,901 children.
Egyptian Nobel Peace prize laureate Mohamed ElBaradei posted a scathing statement on X, in which he said, “The current war is part of Trump’s ‘Deal of the Century’ to transfer Palestinians to Jordan and Sinai and liquidate the Palestinian question.”
“The war is fundamentally a religious war, a belief confirmed by utterances of some U.S. officials,” he said.
He also said there is resentment towards the Arab elites who have been “co-opted” by the West.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Jordan Friday meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
The former leader of the UK’s opposition Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, warned that Gaza faces being “wiped off the face of the earth” and that British politicians would have to reckon with their support for what amounts war crimes by Israel.
His comments stand in stark contrast to his successor Keir Starmer, who has backed Israel’s right to cut off water and electricity to Gaza, an act that amounts to collective punishment and is a war crime under customary international law.
A Palestinian human rights lawyer in Occupied Palestine warned

Western leaders that they are enabling genocide and a new Nakba by condoning “dehumanizing” language used by Israeli leaders.
Speaking to Middle East Eye, Diana Buttu said that Palestinians in “Israel”, as well as the occupied territories, are facing a threat of violence with echoes of the events of 1948.
Dr Mai al-Kaila, the Palestinian minister of health, said that there is a “humanitarian and health catastrophe affecting the Gaza Strip”, as electricity, food and water continue to be cut off in the besieged enclave.
Six hospitals in the Gaza Strip have completely stopped operating.
Residents have no access to showers, toilets, clean running water or food, as Israel continues its heavy bombardment of the strip.
Israeli army tanks and vehicles have been deployed along the fence with Gaza.
A former UN crimes investigator, Marc Grlasco, said: “Israel is dropping in less than a week what the U.S. was dropping in Afghanistan in a year, in a much smaller, much more densely populated area, where mistakes are going to be magnified.”
Human Rights Watch confirmed that the Zionist regime is using white phosphorus “unlawfully” in Gaza.
Tensions flared up in the occupied West Bank, with at least 11 Palestinians martyred by Israeli forces and settlers.
Footage has emerged of Israel’s far-right security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir distributing assault rifles to what was described “civilian security teams” on Thursday night.
He also said he had directed his ministry to purchase more than 10,000 firearms.
Mohamad Elmasry, an associate professor of media studies based in Doha, said media framing of the ongoing war is stereotypical and all too familiar.
He called out the coverage in the mainstream media, including The New York Times, CNN, The Guardian, BBC, USA Today and many others, saying they “have privileged Israeli perspectives; highlighted Israeli casualties and humanity at the expense of Palestinian casualties and humanity; disregarded Palestinian voices and grievances; and overlooked the broader context of the conflict.”
“A person who exclusively follows mainstream western news might be tempted to conclude that Palestinians are predisposed to violence, that they wake up and decide to kill,” he wrote.