CAIRO, February 11. /TASS/. The death toll from Israel’s strikes on the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the current escalation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has climbed to more than 28,400, with over 67,800 people being wounded, Gaza’s health ministry said.

According to the ministry’s post on the Telegram channel, as many as 28,473 people have been killed, including 133 in the past 24 hours alone. As many as 162 more civilians received wounds during the past day, bringing the overall number of those wounded up to 68,146, it added.

The ministry also said that many bodies of those killed are still under the rubble and along streets as rescuers cannot reach them.

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 240 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.