GAZA (Dispatches) - Israeli 
airstrikes martyred at least six Palestinian civilians, including three children, in a massacre in the al-Katiba area of Gaza City, after a terrorist undercover Israeli unit operating deep inside the enclave was discovered and came under fire.
The Israeli military unleashed a barrage of airstrikes, drone fire and smoke bombs on the densely populated neighborhood to cover the withdrawal of the infiltrating special forces unit, according to Ismail Thawabta, director of the Gaza Government Media Office. 
Witnesses described scenes of carnage, with rescue workers pulling the bodies of children from the rubble of buildings hit by the strikes.
“It was a massacre. They struck without warning in a residential area,” said a Palestinian resident who declined to give his name for fear of reprisals. “We saw body parts scattered in the street.”
Local media reported that the undercover unit had entered the area near the American Hospital and a UN shelter using a bus and electric motorcycles, triggering clashes when it was detected by Palestinian fighters. Hamas fighters attempted to capture the Israeli personnel, but were prevented by heavy air cover, Palestinian sources said.
The latest bloodshed occurred despite a U.S.-brokered ceasefire in place since October 2025. Terrorist prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, illegally visiting Gaza on Wednesday, rejected a full U.S.-backed ceasefire agreement, insisting Israeli forces would maintain their presence in the territory – a stance Hamas has ruled out as a precondition for any lasting truce.
More than 1,300 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire took effect, according to Gaza health authorities. The overall death toll from more than two years of genocide, which began in October 2023, has exceeded 73,000, though officials and medical researchers say the true figure may be in the hundreds of thousands when accounting for indirect deaths from the collapse of healthcare and aid systems.
Aid flows into the enclave remain severely restricted, and Israeli strikes on Wednesday killed at least two more Palestinians in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza, medics said. A newly built desalination plant in Gaza City was also destroyed in recent attacks, deepening the territory’s water crisis.