Gaza begins second phase of polio vaccination drive

The second phase of a polio vaccination campaign started in central Gaza, before moving to the south and later to the north.

The second dose of polio vaccine was being administered, in addition to Vitamin A, to protect children against the spread of epidemics and diseases, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

The first round of vaccinations was undertaken last month, after a baby was partially paralyzed by the type 2 polio virus in August, the first such case in the territory in 25 years.

WHO said the campaign aims to reach about 590,000 children under the age of 10 across the Gaza Strip in less than two weeks as part of the second round of the vaccination campaign.

The United Nations voiced concerns that the fighting and the evacuation orders in northern Gaza might affect the vaccination campaign.

In the meanwhile The Israeli army carried out a raid in Jenin in the Israeli occupied West Bank where two Palestinians were killed, said the Palestinian health ministry.

A Palestinian Red Crescent paramedic who was dispatched to tend to a casualty said that the army asked him to bring the body to them, making sure the casualty was dead and was then allowed to take the body to the hospital morgue.

Violence had been escalating for more than two years but picked up in intensity since Hamas fighters, based in the coastal enclave of Gaza, led an attack on Israel last October.

Also outgoing rockets were seen being intercepted over the skies of southern Lebanon in the evening, while muzzle flash could be seen in the distance.

Israel expanded its targets in its war with Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, killing at least 21 people in an airstrike in the north, health officials said, while millions of Israelis took shelter from projectiles fired back across the border.

So far the main focus of Israel's military operations in Lebanon has been in the Bekaa Valley in the east, the suburbs of Beirut, and in the south.