CAIRO, February 2. /TASS/. The number of casualties resulting from the bombing of various districts of the Gaza Strip by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is now over 27,100, the Gaza Health Ministry reported.

"To date, the number of casualties from Israeli bombardment and shelling of the Gaza Strip has totaled 27,131," the Health Ministry said in a statement reported by the Al Hadath TV channel. Since the beginning of the escalation in Gaza, 66,287 people have been injured, according to the ministry.

In the past 24 hours alone, 112 Palestinians were killed and nearly 150 were wounded, the ministry reports.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 200 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to Israeli authorities’ aggressive actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Clashes are also reported in the West Bank.