GAZA STRIP: According to the Palestinian official news agency, Israeli bombings on two schools and a hospital in Gaza resulted in the deaths of over 40 Palestinians and the injuries of numerous others.
The Israeli military claimed to have hit a Hamas military compound “embedded in the schools,” while the Hamas-run government media office claimed that Israel had struck at least 172 “designated shelters,” predominantly schools, that were housing thousands of displaced families in the previous over ten months.
Palestinian TV footage showed bodies strewn throughout the yard of one of the two schools destroyed by explosions, while locals hurried to transfer injured people—including children—into ambulances and transport them to at least two adjacent hospitals.
Health officials in central Gaza said that at least 44 Palestinians had died on Sunday during an Israeli airstrike that targeted a hospital there.
In the last more than ten months, Israeli soldiers have attacked 172 shelters that are intended to house thousands of displaced families.
In addition to the 25 fatalities in the schools of Hassan Salama and Al-Nasser, which housed Palestinian displaced families, dozens more were reportedly wounded, according to the Hamas media and the official Palestinian news agency WAFA. They said that multiple buildings inside the complex were destroyed by the strike.
Although Hamas disputes utilizing civilian establishments for military objectives, the Israeli military has charged the organization of operating from within civilian property.
Five people were killed and at least eighteen injured after an Israeli strike within the Al-Aqsa Hospital compound earlier in the day ignited a fire, according to medical sources.
According to the Israeli military, it struck a militant who “conducted terror activities,” and further explosions suggested the presence of weapons nearby.
The hospital’s grounds are located in Deir Al-Balah, a neighborhood teeming with families uprooted from other sections of the enclave due to conflict.
Three Palestinians were slain in Deir Al-Balah after an Israeli missile hit a house. Eight other people were murdered by separate Israeli strikes—three in a car and eight inside their house in the Jabalia camp in northern Gaza City.
Residents in locations where there was intense fighting last month, north of Rafah and southeast of the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis, reported getting orders from the Israeli military to evacuate.
Health officials reported that the Israeli military campaign in Gaza had resulted in the deaths of at least 39,550 Palestinians.
Israeli soldiers have not stopped their bombing and striking in the Gaza Strip after Saturday’s fruitless diplomacy attempts in Cairo.
Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, stated that Hamas had not yet consented to a proposed ceasefire. Netanyahu has emphasized that Israel must be able to regulate access into northern Gaza and maintain control over areas on the border with Egypt.
Netanyahu is to responsible for the lack of progress, according to Hamas, which claims he was “not interested” in a truce.
“The agreement’s contents extend beyond its specifics,” stated Sami Abu Zuhri, a representative of Hamas. “Netanyahu is provoking an unprecedented conflict in the region.”
Following the death of Hamas leader and former Palestinian prime minister Ismail Haniyeh last week, tensions in the region have escalated. Both Hamas and Iran have accused Israel of carrying out the assassination and have vowed to retaliate.
