The UN-run school sheltering displaced Palestinians in central Gaza’s Nuseirat camp came under Israeli air attack killing at least 40 people, mainly women and children. Thousands of displaced Palestinians were sheltering at al-Sardi school, linked to the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) when it came under attack.
Amid an insane escalation of violence that has overwhelmed hospitals in Gaza, came the attack on Nuseirat refugee camp. Israeli forces have bombed a United Nations-linked school in central Gaza where forcibly displaced Palestinians are sheltering, killing at least 40 and wounding more than 70.
Gaza’s government media office and the Health Ministry officials confirmed the death toll, which included 14 children and 9 women, following Thursday’s predawn strikes, which hit al-Sardi school and homes in Nuseirat camp.
Condemning the attack on Thursday as a horrible massacre, Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip, said many women and children were among those killed and wounded. The Palestinian Wafa news agency said that thousands of displaced Palestinians were sheltering at al-Sardi school, linked to the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), when it came under attack.
A spokesperson for Gaza’s government media office, Ismail al-Thawabta said huge numbers of dead and wounded were arriving at the Al-Aqsa Hospital in central Gaza, which had reached three times its clinical capacity. This horrible massacre committed by the Israeli occupation is clear evidence of genocide, and ethnic cleansing against civilians, including women and children and displaced people in the Gaza Strip.
Confirming the bombing Israel’s military said its fighter jets struck a Hamas compound embedded inside a UNRWA school in the area of Nuseirat. It claimed the bombing eliminated terrorists who were planning to carry out attacks against its forces.
Hamas rejecting the Israeli statement said the occupation uses lying to public opinion through false, fabricated stories to justify the brutal crime it conducted against dozens of displaced people. The attack on al-Sardi came as Israeli forces stepped up their bombardment of Gaza even as the United States and mediators continued to press ahead with an effort to secure a ceasefire deal.
Israeli forces had killed at least 102 people in 24 hours before the latest attack on Nuseirat. These included attacks on the Bureij and Maghazi refugee camps, also located in central Gaza.
Describing the situation in Gaza as apocalyptic, Doctors Without Borders, the group known by its French acronym MSF, in a statement said the Al-Aqsa Hospital had received 70 dead people and more than 300 injured since Tuesday, and that the majority of the casualties were women and children.
In the hospital’s emergency room, the odor of blood was unbearable. People were lying everywhere, on the floor, and outside bodies were being brought in plastic bags. The situation is overwhelming.
Halting most humanitarian deliveries into the Palestinian enclave, the insane escalation of violence across the Gaza Strip, and the closure of the Rafah border crossing have stretched the health system to the point of collapse. This man-made catastrophe needs to stop now.
In Israel’s eight-month war on Gaza, at least 36,586 Palestinians have been killed and 83,074 have been wounded. However, efforts to end the war have so far made little headway. CIA director William Burns was in Qatar’s capital, Doha, on Wednesday to discuss a three-phase truce proposal touted last week by US President Joe Biden.
Sticking points remain even though regional and international powers have backed the proposal, however, Hamas has insisted on a permanent ceasefire and full withdrawal of Israeli troops. Israel has rejected those demands, saying it is prepared to discuss only temporary pauses until Hamas is defeated. Its Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has rejected a halt to the fighting.
