Israel said it struck a school housing refugees in northern Gaza Saturday that had been sheltering over a dozen Hamas terror operatives and senior commanders.
Local health officials said at least 90 people were killed in the strike on the Tabeen school in Gaza City, but the Israel Defense Forces said the Hamas-backed administrators inflated the number of casualties.
Fadel Naeem, director of al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City, said the facility had received 70 corpses from the strike and the body parts from at least 10 others, while Mahmoud Bassal, spokesperson for the Hamas-run Palestinian Civil Defense, said in a televised news conference there were “more than 93 martyrs, including 11 children and six women.”
Gaza’s Hamas-run media office said people who had been sheltering in the complex were saying dawn prayers during the attack. Izzat El-Reshiq, of Hamas’ political office, claimed none of those killed were militants.
The Israeli military, however, said by Gazan officials numbers were “exaggerated and do not match the information available in the IDF, the precise munitions used, and the accuracy of the strike.” It estimated about 20 terrorists were killed in the strike.
The IDF hit an “active” Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad command center set up in a mosque at the Tabeen school, according to IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani.
The terror operatives had been using the hub — located in a compound that was also serving as a shelter for Palestinians — as a hideout where they could plot attacks on Israeli forces, the IDF said. The IDF said it took precautions to limit the harm to civilians.
Israeli military officials lashed out at Hamas for violating international law by using the civilians and institutions in Gaza “as human shields for their terror activities.”
Military assessments have found that as the war continues, Hamas operatives are struggling to remain inside tunnels for long periods of time, forcing them to relocate to above-ground locations where they are hiding among civilians, The Times of Israel reported.
On Thursday, the IDF said it had struck Hamas command and control centers embedded in two schools in the Daraj and Tuffah neighborhoods. On Monday, the military said it killed several Hamas terrorists, including the commander of the group’s Al-Furqan Battalion, in a strike on a school in Gaza City.
International leaders tore into Israel for Saturday’s strike, including European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, who was criticized in recent months as fanning the flames of antisemitism in the bloc by excessively criticizing Israel.
“Horrified by images from a sheltering school in Gaza hit by an Israeli strike, with reportedly dozens of Palestinian victims,” he said.
Egypt’s foreign ministry, meanwhile, said Saturday’s attack shows Israel lacks the “political will” to reach a ceasefire, while Qatar’s foreign ministry called the strike a “horrific massacre.”
Both nations, along with the United States, this week called on Israel and Hamas to resume discussions on a ceasefire-for-hostage deal on Aug. 15.
The conflict in Gaza, now in its 10th month, was sparked by Hamas’ rampage on southern Israel on Oct. 7, where terrorists murdered roughly 1,200 people and kidnapped another 250.
Since Israel launched its campaign in the war-torn territory, over 39,790 Palestinians have been killed, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and fighters in its death toll.
The IDF said Saturday the war has killed 689 Israeli soldiers and wounded 4,303.
In other developments:
*Jordan reportedly will let Israel use its airspace to stop an Iranian attack expected to be launched in retaliation for the assassination of top Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last month, an official in Amman told Israel’s Channel 12. Jordan, however, has officially denied making such a pledge.
*The IDF said it killed another senior Hamas commander, Walid al-Sousi, in an airstrike Friday night in Gaza, the Jerusalem Post reported. Al-Sousi had been the head of the terror group’s General Security Apparatus in the territory’s southern region and was responsible for handling intelligence as well as eliminating opposition to Hamas’ control.
*The US Central Command announced late Friday it had destroyed in the past 24 hours a Houthi missile launcher supplied by Iran as well as a drone boat in areas of Yemen controlled by the terror group. US forces also took out a pair of Houthi drones that had been flying over the Red Sea, officials said.
With Post wires.
