Palestinian death toll has surpassed 70,000, officials say

The Palestinian death toll has surpassed 70,000 since the IsraelHamas war began, Gaza’s Health Ministry said Saturday, while a hospital said that Israeli fire killed two Palestinian children in the territory’s south.

- WAFAA SHURAFA AND SAMY MAGDY

PALESTINIAN children play where they can. Two other youths were killed by a drone, officials said.

MAJDI FATHI NurPhoto

The toll has continued to rise after the latest ceasefire took effect Oct. 10. Israel still carries out strikes in response to what it has called violations of the truce, and bodies from earlier in the war are being recovered.

Staff at Nasser Hospital, which received the bodies of the children in southern Gaza, said the brothers, ages 8 and 11, died when an Israeli drone struck near a school sheltering displaced people in the town of Beni Suhaila.

Israel's military said it killed two people who crossed into an Israeli-controlled area, “conducted suspicious activities” and approached troops. The statement didn’t mention children. The military said it also killed another person in a similar incident in the south.