Israeli forces launched a series of airstrikes across the Gaza Strip on Monday evening, striking a municipal water desalination plant, an ancient mosque, a prayer hall, and several residential homes. The attacks killed a man and a sleeping child, injured dozens of civilians, and left families homeless following brief evacuation warnings.
The renewed bombardment follows an official policy shift announced by Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, who declared a “zero tolerance and zero containment” stance against Palestinians launching airborne paper kites and balloons across the perimeter fence.
The Israeli military issued rapid phone and broadcast evacuation orders across multiple areas of Gaza, giving residents limited time to flee before missiles struck.
The strikes began hours after Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz posted on X that he had agreed with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to enforce strict retaliatory measures against kite launches, attributing the activity to Hamas.
An Israeli airstrike targets a prayer hall in the Al-Shati refugee camp in northwestern Gaza City on Monday, Aug. 24, 2026Katz stated that Israel will treat kites and incendiary balloons with the same posture as unmanned aerial vehicles, whether carrying explosives or not. Katz explicitly stated that Israel would not return to its pre-October 6, 2023 policy, invoking the Great March of Return demonstrations, balloon launches, and the subsequent border breach during the October 7 attacks.
Israeli Channel 12 reported earlier Monday that a kite landed in the settlement of Nahal Oz, east of Gaza.
Following Katz’s statements, Israeli military officers placed direct phone calls to residents in northern Gaza City, giving them less than 30 minutes to vacate.
An Israeli fighter jet subsequently fired three missiles into the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, destroying a community drinking water desalination plant opened just weeks prior. The strike destroyed the underlying residential structure, leaving three families totaling more than 20 people without shelter, a resident told Al Manassa.
An Israeli airstrike targets a water desalination facility northwest of Gaza City on Monday, Aug. 24, 2026Minutes later, an Israeli military officer called a resident in the Shati refugee camp west of Gaza City, granting less than 30 minutes to evacuate the residential block before two missiles struck and destroyed the Asqalan prayer hall.
The military then shifted targets to central Gaza. In the Bureij refugee camp, a resident received a phone call instructing him to evacuate. "Every couple of days there is an evacuation and a bombing," one resident told Al Manassa. “The walls of our house are cracked, and we are terrified that one day we will leave and come back to find it collapsed.”
A subsequent strike in Bureij aimed two missiles at a house belonging to the Al-Wir family. While that specific home had been evacuated, the blast destroyed an adjacent building where a child was sleeping. Family members had not noticed the sleeping child during the rushed evacuation, and the child was killed in the strike, a medical source at Al-Awda Hospital informed Al Manassa.
A journalist present at the scene reported that the neighboring structure collapsed onto a mother and her two young daughters who remained inside. Civil Defense crews cleared the debris and rescued the mother and daughters, who suffered minor injuries.
In Deir Al-Balah, Israeli forces issued a telephone warning surrounding the historic Abi Salim Mosque in the city center before firing two missiles, partially destroying the site. Israeli jets then targeted a residential block on Sea Street in southwestern Deir Al-Balah, hitting the Fayyad family home. Shrapnel from the explosion traveled over half a kilometer, causing minor injuries to four people.
In southern Gaza, an reconnaissance drone launched a missile without prior warning into a crowd of citizens gathered west of the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis. A journalist at the complex told Al Manassa that hospital staff received the remains of one killed man and treated eight injured individuals.
Late Monday night, the Israeli military ordered residents in the Al-Tawam area of northern Gaza to evacuate, granting them less than 10 minutes. A subsequent strike fired two missiles into a home, completely destroying it, an eyewitness told Al Manassa.
The ministry noted that additional victims remain trapped beneath rubble and along roadways that emergency crews and Civil Defense teams cannot reach.
According to the daily statistical report from Gaza’s health ministry, two people were killed and 32 others were injured and brought to local hospitals just over the past 24 hours.
Since the Oct. 11 ceasefire agreement, 1,288 Palestinians have been killed, bringing the cumulative death toll since Oct. 7, 2023, to 73,422.
The ministry also reported that Israeli forces have targeted 1,244 out of 1,275 mosques across the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023, with 1,077 mosques completely destroyed.
