Palestinian health officials say Israeli airstrike on Gaza school killed more than 60 people: NPR

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DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — An Israeli airstrike hit a school that is now a shelter in Gaza City early Saturday, killing more than 60 people, Palestinian health authorities said, in one of the deadliest strikes in the 10-month war between Israel and Hamas.

The Israeli military acknowledged the airstrike, claiming it hit a Hamas command center inside the school. Hamas denied using the school as a command center.

The attack on the Tabeen school in central Gaza City also injured 47 people, the Ministry of Health’s ambulance and emergency services said. The facility, like most schools in Gaza, has been used as a shelter for people forced to flee their homes because of the war.

According to Abu Anas, a witness who participated in the rescue, the attack happened without warning early in the morning before sunrise while people were praying at a mosque inside the school.

“There were people praying, there were people doing laundry, and there were people sleeping upstairs, including children, women, and old people,” he said. “The rockets fell on them without warning. The first rocket, and the second rocket. We recovered them like body parts.”

Mahmoud Bassal, spokesman for the Civil Defense first responders operating under the Hamas-run government, said three rockets tore through the school and mosque inside, where about 6,000 displaced people had taken refuge from the fighting.

Many of the dead were unidentifiable, he said, adding that he expected the death toll to rise. Many of the casualties were women and children, he said.

According to the United Nations, as of July 6, 477 of Gaza’s 564 schools had been directly hit or damaged in the fighting. In June, an Israeli airstrike on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in central Gaza killed at least 33 people, including 12 women and children, according to local health officials.

Israel blames Hamas for civilian deaths in Gaza, saying the group endangers non-combatants by using schools and residential areas as bases for operations and attacks.

In a statement on Saturday, the Israeli military claimed that Hamas militants had used the school as a base to plan attacks on Israeli forces, but did not provide evidence. It said the school was located next to a mosque that was used as a shelter for Gaza City residents.

The airstrike came as US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators continued to push for a ceasefire that could help ease rising tensions in the region following the assassinations of senior Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut.

Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza and plays a key mediating role, said the attack on the school showed Israel had no intention of reaching a ceasefire and ending the war.

According to the enclave’s Health Ministry, Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed more than 39,600 Palestinians and injured more than 91,700 others. The war began after an October 7 Hamas offensive in which militants from Gaza stormed southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people and kidnapping 250 others.

More than 1.9 million of Gaza’s pre-war population of 2.3 million have been displaced, fleeing multiple times across the territory to escape attacks. Most are now crammed into makeshift tent camps in an area of ​​about 50 square kilometres (19 square miles) on Gaza’s coast.