Panic grips Gaza as Israel demands 1.1 million people evacuate in 24 hours

Many Gazans were reluctant to leave their homes, and Hamas officials urged Palestinians not to comply with what they called Israel’s “psychological warfare.” The United Nations pleaded for Israel to rescind the demand for a forced relocation out of fear of a humanitarian disaster. The Israeli military said Friday morning that there was no firm deadline for people to leave the north and acknowledged that it “will take time.”

Frightened Palestinians packed belongings and left their homes in northern Gaza on Friday after Israel’s military demanded that more than 1 million civilians move to the south of the blockaded coastal strip within 24 hours, a possible precursor to a ground invasion but one that the United Nations warned could be calamitous.

Israel’s buildup of soldiers near the border with the Gaza Strip has fueled speculation that it is preparing to invade the Hamas-held territory in response to last weekend’s incursion that killed more than 1,300 people. Israel last sent troops into the enclave in 2014.

But many Gazans were reluctant to leave their homes, and Hamas officials urged Palestinians not to comply with what they called Israel’s “psychological warfare.”

Israel’s retaliatory airstrikes since Saturday, deadlier and more widespread than in its past campaigns in Gaza, have wiped out entire neighborhoods, brought the medical system to the brink of collapse and forced about 400,000 people into temporary shelters as they face dire shortages of food, water and fuel. Gaza’s health ministry said that 1,537 Palestinians, including 500 children, had been killed since Saturday, and that 6,612 people, one-quarter of them children, had been injured.

The United Nations pleaded for Israel to rescind the demand for a forced relocation out of fear of a humanitarian disaster. The Israeli military said Friday morning that there was no firm deadline for people to leave the north and acknowledged that it “will take time.”

Panic gripped many residents of Gaza City, the most populous part of the territory, as they weighed whether to leave their homes for a more rural area with even fewer resources. The roads on the route have been damaged by a week of airstrikes, many people do not have cars and few have places to stay in southern Gaza.

Here is what else to know:

— Protesters were gathering in the Israeli-occupied West Bank as well as in Iraq, Lebanon and elsewhere in the Middle East in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Hamas has called for worldwide demonstrations on Friday to oppose Israeli actions in Gaza.

— A day after visiting Israel, the U.S. secretary of state, Antony Blinken, met with King Abdullah II of Jordan and discussed the need to speed the delivery of emergency supplies into Gaza “while protecting civilians and working to end the escalation and the war,” according to a statement by Jordanian officials. Israel has said it will not allow any supplies into Gaza, and Egypt, which controls the other border with the territory, has not said whether it will do so.

— Blinken was later scheduled to meet with Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority, which lost control of Gaza in 2007 when Hamas took it by force. Blinken is then expected to fly to Qatar, after which he will go on to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, in an effort to “prevent the conflict from spreading,” according to the State Department.

— A Hamas spokesperson, Abu Ubaida, said Thursday that the group had achieved more than it had hoped for in its attack on Israel, which he said involved a 3,000-person battalion and a 1,500-person backup force. “We are telling the enemy, if you dare enter Gaza, we will destroy your army,” he said.