As Israeli ground assault looms, civilians in Gaza search for food, water and safety

The latest: 

Gaza's 2.3 million civilians faced a continuing struggle for food, water and safety on Sunday and braced for a looming Israeli invasion, eight days after Hamas militants launched a deadly assault on Israel. While hundreds of thousands sought to heed Israel's order to evacuate the north, others huddled at hospitals there.

Israeli forces, supported by a growing deployment of U.S. warships in the region, positioned themselves along Gaza's border and drilled for what Israel said would be a broad campaign to dismantle the militant group. A week of blistering airstrikes have demolished entire neighbourhoods but failed to stem militant rocket fire into Israel.

The Gaza Health Ministry said 2,670 Palestinians have been killed since the fighting erupted, more than in the 2014 Gaza war, which lasted over six weeks. That makes this the deadliest of the five Gaza wars for both sides.

More than 1,400 Israelis have been killed, the vast majority of them civilians killed in Hamas's Oct. 7 assault. This is the deadliest war for Israel since the 1973 conflict with Egypt and Syria.

Julie Sunday, the assistant deputy minister for consular, security and emergency management at Global Affairs Canada, confirmed on Sunday that a fifth Canadian is among those killed during the violence and three others remain missing.

"It's an extremely tragic outcome," she told a media briefing in Ottawa, without providing details.

Israel dropped leaflets over Gaza City in the north and renewed warnings on social media, ordering more than one million Palestinians — almost half the territory's population — to move south. The military says it is trying to clear away civilians ahead of a major campaign against Hamas militants in the north, including in what it said were underground hideouts in Gaza City. Hamas urged people to stay in their homes.

Many Gazans have said they don't want to leave their homes, fearing a repeat of the "Nakba" or "catastrophe," when many Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes during the 1948 war that accompanied Israel's creation.

The military said Sunday that it would refrain from targeting a single route south from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., again urging Palestinians to leave the north en masse. The military offered two corridors and a longer window the day before.

The UN and aid groups say such a rapid exodus, along with Israel's complete siege of the 40-kilometre-long coastal territory would cause untold human suffering.

The World Health Organization said the evacuation "could be tantamount to a death sentence" for the more than 2,000 patients in northern hospitals, including newborns in incubators and people in intensive care. Gaza's hospitals are expected to run out of fuel for emergency generators within two days, according to the UN.

According to a WHO statement on Sunday, four hospitals in northern Gaza are "no longer functioning as a result of damage and targeting," while 21 hospitals have been instructed to evacuate by Israeli forces. Health-care workers in the region have refused to evacuate, citing a need to care for patients, elderly people, and people with disabilities who cannot easily leave.

Gaza was already in a humanitarian crisis due to a growing shortage of water and medical supplies caused by the Israeli siege, which has also forced electrical plants to shut down without fuel. With some bakeries closing, residents complained of being unable to buy bread for their children.