RAMALLAH, occupied West Bank (IPS) - At least 42 Palestinians sheltering in a UN school in the Jabaliya refugee camp near Gaza City were killed Tuesday afternoon after two Israeli tank shells exploded outside the school. Hundreds of terrified Palestinians, desperately trying to escape the bombing, had sought shelter there assuming that a clearly marked school would not be targeted. Palestinian sources reported that the school was one of 26 residential buildings hit Tuesday. Read more about Israel attacks schools, ambulances 

A good, kind, brave and very funny man was killed on 4 January as he loaded the body of a young civilian killed by the Israeli occupation forces into an ambulance. Emergency medical workers, Arafa Hani Abed al-Dayem (35), and Alaa Ossama Sarhan (21), answered the call to retrieve two friends: Thaer Abed Hammad (19), who was wounded, and his friend Ali (19), who was killed while fleeing shelling by Israeli tanks. Eva Bartlett writes from the besieged Gaza Strip. Read more about I will tell you how Arafa died 

Israel claims to have attacked 1,000 of what it calls “Hamas targets.” Independent media, UN aid officials and human rights organizations have documented that most of these attacks struck private homes, mosques, universities, schools, government buildings, police stations and charities. The Electronic Intifada correspondent Rami Almeghari reports from the besieged Gaza Strip. Read more about Witnesses to Israel's war crimes 

Thousands of Egyptians have taken to the streets to protest the continuing Israeli aggression against Gaza and the participation of the Egyptian regime in the isolation of its population. Last Wednesday, the state responded with a major crackdown in which tens of protestors and journalists were assaulted and arrested. Per Bjorklund reports from Cairo. Read more about Egypt government feels its people's ire 

GENEVA (IRIN) - The UN has warned that power networks were down in large parts of the Gaza Strip on 4 January, with hospitals relying on generators. Without power for pumps, 70 percent of Gazans are estimated to be without tap water. Israel has been blocking fuel supplies, and stocks are dwindling, the latest (4 January) report by the UN’s humanitarian coordinator in the occupied Palestinian territories said. Read more about Water, sewage system "collapsing" in Gaza, says official 

All Palestinian factions have united and are out facing the enemy, using all of their military capabilities that they collectively have. Although these capabilities are incomparable to the military strength exerted by Israel, yet it has made us more certain than ever that Palestinians will fight to the very end to protect their own. Safa Joudeh writes from the Gaza Strip. Read more about Resisting to protect our own 

My family is from Karatiya village a few kilometers away from the Gaza Strip in what is now called Israel. Karatiya is one of the 450 towns in historical Palestine that were cleansed by Zionist militias in 1948, displacing my family along with hundreds of thousands of other Palestinians. I now live in Maghazi refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, which is currently being bombarded by Israel from tanks along the border, American-manufactured F-16s in the sky, and from the sea. The Electronic Intifada correspondent Rami Almeghari reports from the besieged Gaza Strip. Read more about Scared but steadfast in Gaza