Palestinians struggled to flee from areas of Gaza targeted by the Israeli military while grappling with a growing water and medical supply shortage ahead of an expected land offensive.
An estimated 1 million people have been displaced in Gaza in one week, a United Nations spokesperson said.
A week after Hamas' attack, Israel was still working to assess the full extent of the casualties. With special rabbinic approval, workers at a military base in central Israel continued the grueling task of identifying the bodies of the Israelis and foreign nationals who were killed, mostly civilians. Work is normally halted on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath.
At a news conference, relatives of hostages with medical conditions called on Hamas to allow a humanitarian corridor for the delivery of medicine to them. "My aunt suffers from Parkinson's Disease. She's 63," said Yifat Zailer. "Every day without her medication is torture." Hamas remained defiant. In a televised speech Saturday, Ismail Haniyeh, a top Hamas official, said that "all the massacres" will not break the Palestinian people.
Some 35,000 displaced civilians crammed into the grounds of Gaza City's main hospital, sitting under trees as well as inside the building's lobby and corridors, hoping to be protected from the fighting, medical officials said. Near the coast, the only tap water is contaminated with Mediterranean Sea water because of the lack of sanitation facilities. Mohammed Ibrahim, 28, said his neighbors in Gaza City have taken to drinking the salt water.
Others were looking desperately for ways to evacuate. "We need a number for drivers from Gaza to the south, it is necessary #help," read a post on social media. Patients and personnel from Al Awda Hospital in Gaza's far north spent part of the night in the street "with bombs landing in close proximity," the medical aid group Doctors Without Borders said.
The Gaza Health Ministry said Saturday that over 2,200 people have been killed in the territory, including 724 children and 458 women. The Hamas communications office said Israel has "completely demolished" over 7,000 housing units so far.
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