Israeli airstrikes on the al-Mawasi camp in southern Gaza killed at least 90 people and wounded 300 others, Palestinian health officials said.
Saturday’s attack on the Israeli-designated “safe zone” west of Khan Younis in southern Gaza involved fighter jets and drones, witnesses said.
Israeli officials said the attack targeted two senior members of Hamas’ military wing, claiming they were hiding among civilians.
Hamas dismissed the claim as “false,” saying it was a cover-up for the “horrific massacre” at a location where displaced Palestinians had been urged to seek refuge after being ordered to evacuate their homes elsewhere in the Gaza Strip.
Here’s everything you need to know about the attack and its aftermath:
What is the situation on the ground?
The attack killed at least 90 civilians in a densely populated area home to about 80,000 people, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
Israeli warplanes struck tents housing displaced Palestinians and a water distillation unit.
According to Tareq Abu Azzoum, an Tel Aviv Tribune journalist in Deir el-Balah, in central Gaza, the area was hit by “five bombs and five missiles.”
Displaced people who had taken refuge in the area said their tents had been torn away by the force of the strikes and described bodies and body parts strewn on the ground.
“I couldn’t even tell where I was or what was happening,” said Sheikh Youssef, a Gaza City resident who is displaced in the al-Mawasi area.
“I left the tent and looked around. All the tents were torn down, body parts, bodies everywhere, old women thrown on the ground, young children in pieces,” he told Reuters news agency.
The injured were taken to the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, which is critically short of staff and essential equipment. Rescuers say the Israeli army attacked teams that were going to the scene to help the victims.
A Nasser hospital official told Tel Aviv Tribune that medical teams did not have the capacity to receive more wounded as civil defence teams continued to work on search and rescue operations at the site of the attack.
Mohammad Subeh, an emergency doctor working at one of the field hospitals near al-Mawasi, told Tel Aviv Tribune that rescuers were “pulling people out of the ground”.
The al-Mawasi area has been attacked several times by the Israeli army, with a strike in late May hitting tents housing displaced families, killing at least 21 people.
What do Israeli officials say?
The Israeli military said in a statement that it acted on “precise intelligence” to strike an area where “two senior Hamas terrorists” and other fighters were hiding among civilians. It described the location of the strike as “an open area surrounded by trees, several buildings and hangars.”
The individuals targeted were Rafa’a Salameh, commander of Hamas’ Khan Younis Brigade, and Mohammed Deif, head of Hamas’ military wing, both accused of masterminding Hamas’ October 7 attack on southern Israel.
Speaking at the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was “not absolutely certain” that Hamas officials were killed in the attack, but maintained that it had nevertheless been beneficial to Israel.
“The simple attempt to assassinate Hamas commanders sends a message to the world, a message that Hamas’s days are numbered,” he said. “And that’s what I’m going to do next week in the U.S. Congress. I’m going to take Israel’s message to the United States and to the world.”
Mr Netanyahu said he approved the strike after receiving satisfactory information about the collateral damage and the type of munitions to be used. He added that the Israeli army would kill “one way or another” all Hamas leaders.
Tel Aviv Tribune’s Hamdah Salhut, reporting from Amman, Jordan, said Netanyahu’s directive to “target and kill Hamas officials wherever they are,” claiming he was carrying out precise and targeted attacks, had been repeatedly used as justification to strike civilians in the densely populated Gaza Strip.
What do Palestinian leaders say?
Khalil al-Hayya, Hamas’ deputy leader in Gaza, said Netanyahu had wanted to declare a “false victory” and that allegations that Hamas leaders had been targeted were false.
“Mohammad Deif is listening to you now and laughing at your false and empty statements,” he told Tel Aviv Tribune Arabic.
Hamas had earlier issued a statement on Telegram calling on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem to “mobilize” in response to the attack.
“We call on all resistance brigades to mobilize for Gaza and in full loyalty to the blood of the martyrs,” the statement read.
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) armed group said in a statement that Israel was “continuing the war of extermination against our people.”
“This crime confirms that the occupation has flouted all international norms and conventions,” the PIJ said.
Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa condemned Israel’s “genocidal crimes” in Gaza, saying Palestinians were “going through a very difficult time.”
Mustafa said Israel’s actions were aimed more broadly at the Palestinian project as a whole and included Israel’s goal of establishing an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.
Hanan Ashrawi, an academic and activist, said the attack on al-Mawasi had “turned the whole of Gaza into a huge death zone.”
“American bombs and shells are raining down on Gaza while the Israeli government and its thugs manage to prevent any form of medical, food or fuel supplies from reaching the devastated population,” she said in a message on X.
Today’s horrific massacre and savage bombing of displaced Palestinians in the Israeli-designated “safe” areas of Muassi and Khan Younis are the latest step in an escalation that has turned the entire Gaza Strip into a vast death zone. American bombs and shells rain down on Gaza as Israeli forces…
— Hanan Ashrawi (@DrHananAshrawi) July 13, 2024
What is the situation under international law?
Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, told Tel Aviv Tribune that the attacks may have violated international law.
“People living in a safe zone are protected by international law. If a military target is in a safe zone, the action must be proportional to the military advantage that results. Killing 70 people for one is not proportional,” she said.
“I am sickened by Israel’s tolerance of impunity that allows genocidal war,” she added.
In March, the UN expert released a report saying there were “reasonable grounds” to believe Israel was committing genocide in Gaza.
How is the world reacting?
Egypt
“We condemn in the strongest terms the Israeli raids in the al-Mawasi area,” the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The ministry stressed that “continued violations of the rights of Palestinian citizens” significantly complicate the conclusion of a ceasefire agreement.
Qatar
The Qatari Foreign Ministry said that “the repetition of these heinous crimes proves day after day the need for urgent international action to immediately end this brutal aggression and ensure the protection of the Palestinian people.”
He also warned that Israel’s “recklessness” would undermine international efforts to implement a two-state solution “and thus pave the way for the expansion of the cycle of violence in the region and the threat to international peace and security.”
Saudi Arabia
The Foreign Ministry called for “activating international accountability mechanisms” against Israeli abuses. “The Foreign Ministry condemns in the strongest terms the continued genocidal massacres against the Palestinian people at the hands of the Israeli war machine,” it said in a statement.
Iran
Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said the attack was the “latest crime in a series of crimes committed by the child-killing Zionist regime,” in a message posted on X.
“The Zionists have once again brutally shown that in order to compensate for the defeats suffered on the battlefield with the resistance, they do not recognize any human and moral red line towards the defenseless inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, but they must know that insisting on this path is nothing but a broader global hatred.”
Jordan
The Jordanian Foreign Ministry condemned the attack on the tents of the “displaced persons” in a statement. Spokesman Sufyan al-Qudah said Jordan denounces Israel’s continued violation of international law and stressed the need for the international community to act to end the suffering of the Palestinians.
Colombia
President Gustavo Petro expressed his outrage at what he called “the greatest injustice.”
“I am all the more outraged that this destruction of international human law is a prelude to the barbarity that they want to unleash on all the oppressed peoples of the earth,” he said in a message on X.