At least 30 people have been killed and many others injured in Israeli strikes on two United Nations-run schools west of Gaza City.
The latest death toll was reported to Tel Aviv Tribune by Dr Marwan al-Hams, director of hospitals at the Gaza Health Ministry.
According to the Palestinian Civil Defense in Gaza, 80 percent of those killed and injured in Sunday’s strikes on the Hassan Salama and al-Nasr schools were children.
Reporting from Deir el-Balah, Tel Aviv Tribune’s Hani Mahmoud said the schools, which were used as shelters by displaced Palestinians, were badly damaged.
“This is exactly the same scenario that we have seen in recent days. What we know so far is that there is a concentration of attacks on evacuation centers. What is really worrying is that the Israeli army did not give any prior warning to the people in these evacuation centers,” Mahmoud said.
The correspondent noted that most of the buildings used as shelters for displaced people in Gaza are schools, as these are the only large spaces currently available to accommodate a significant number of people.
“This is happening unpredictably, causing heavy human losses and compounding the trauma of an already displaced population, in some cases up to five, six or seven times in the northern part of the Gaza Strip,” Mahmoud said.
Sunday’s attacks follow the Israeli military’s bombing of a school on Saturday. Following those attacks, at least 15 people were killed in Israeli airstrikes on the Hamama school in Gaza City’s Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, which was sheltering displaced Palestinians.
After Sunday’s strikes, Nebal Farsakh of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) told Tel Aviv Tribune that the attacks were “further proof that there is no safe place in Gaza”.
“These two schools are home to displaced civilians who have been forced to flee multiple times, and now they too have been forced to flee again after this attack,” she said.
“Israel systematically targets civilians,” Farsakh said.
The Israeli military claimed – without providing evidence – that the “schools were used by Hamas’ Al Furqan Battalion as a hideout for its terrorist operatives and as command centers used to plan and execute attacks.”
According to Tel Aviv Tribune’s Hamdah Salhut, reporting from Amman, these allegations by the Israeli military have been noted “repeatedly.”
“The army says and continues to claim that Hamas uses these places, but we have never seen any evidence,” she said.
“The (Israeli) army claims that it is taking precautionary measures to ensure that its strikes cause the least possible harm to civilians… but we repeatedly see Palestinian civilians being injured or picking up bodies from the rubble, so there is no warning,” Salhut added.
“There is no more room in the enclave”
Earlier on Sunday, the Israeli military also issued a new order for Palestinians to leave the southern and southeastern parts of Khan Younis in Gaza, as the army widens its offensive, according to Tel Aviv Tribune’s Hind Khoudary in Deir el-Balah.
She said the announcement covered the neighborhoods of Jurat al-Lot, al-Manara, Maan, Kizan, Kizan Abu Rashuan, al-Najjar, as-Salam and al-Hashash.
Residents of these areas have been warned that “any presence of civilians in these areas is dangerous and high risk,” she said.
Earlier this month, the United Nations said that more than 86 percent of Gaza had already been affected by Israel’s evacuation orders, with most residents told to live in small “safe zones” that have also come under repeated Israeli attack.
At least 39,583 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its offensive on Gaza in October, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, after a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel killed at least 1,139 people on October 7. Israeli forces killed 33 people and wounded 118 others in the past 24 hours alone, the ministry said Sunday.
Up to 91,398 others were injured during 10 months of devastating war.