Israel has used one of its biggest and most destructive bombs in an area designated safe for civilians in southern parts of the war-torn Gaza Strip, a report says.
In an investigative report on Thursday, The New York Times said that the Tel Aviv regime routinely used one of its biggest and most destructive bombs in so-called safe zones in the besieged Palestinian enclave during the first six weeks of its war on Gaza.
The report, supported by an analysis of visual evidence, focused on the use of 2,000-pound bombs in an area in southern Gaza where Israel ordered Gazans to move for safety and promised not to bomb there.
The Times’ research team used an AI tool to examine images taken by satellites of southern parts of Gaza for bomb craters measuring around 40 feet across or larger, with bomb experts saying that typically only 2,000-pound munitions are able to create such big craters in Gaza’s light and sandy soil.
After manually reviewing the satellite imagery as well as drone footage, the researchers managed to identify 208 craters in the densely-populated area. However, they stressed that due to limited satellite imagery and variations in a bomb’s effects, there are likely to have been many cases that were not captured.
The Israeli regime waged the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian Hamas resistance group carried out the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime’s atrocities against Palestinians.
Since the start of the US-backed offensive, the Israeli regime has killed more than 20,057 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured 532,320 others. Thousands more are also missing and presumed dead under the rubble.
The United States has fully supported Israel in terms of weapons and munitions since the onset of the war. Since October, Washington has also sent more than 5,000 MK-84 munitions, which is a type of 2,000-pound bomb.
