Israeli airstrikes hit two schools in Gaza City on Sunday, killing at least 30 people, Palestinian officials said, while the Israeli military said it attacked a Hamas military compound located in the schools.
Earlier in the day, an Israeli airstrike hit a tent camp inside a hospital in central Gaza. Gaza health officials said a total of at least 44 Palestinians were killed on Sunday, a day after a round of talks in Cairo ended without result.
Footage broadcast on Palestinian media showed bodies scattered in the courtyard of one of two schools destroyed by the blast, while residents rushed to carry the injured, including children, into ambulances and take them to at least two nearby hospitals.
Gaza’s civil emergency service said dozens of people were wounded in gunfire that hit schools in the Hassan Salama and al-Nasser areas, where Palestinian displaced families live.
The Israeli military said it attacked Hamas command militants based in schools and that it had taken steps to reduce the threat to civilians there.
Israel says the Islamist militant group Hamas regularly infiltrates civilian institutions and uses Gaza’s population as human shields. Hamas denies this.
Earlier in the day, an Israeli attack on the Al-Aqsa hospital compound set off a fire, leaving at least 18 people injured and five dead, medical officials said.
The Israeli military said it attacked a militant operating there and that secondary explosions had been detected, indicating weapons were present in the area.
The hospital complex is in Deir al-Balah, an area filled with thousands of people displaced by fighting in other areas.
Elsewhere in Deir al-Balah, three Palestinians were killed when an Israeli missile hit a house. Eight others were killed inside their home and three people inside a car in the Jabalia camp in northern Gaza City in separate Israeli strikes.
Residents in areas southeast of the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis and north of Rafah reported they had received evacuation orders from the Israeli military, where heavy fighting took place last month.
An Israeli army spokesman issued an order on X, asking residents of those districts to move to humanitarian zones and said the army would soon take strict action against terrorists attacking from those areas.
In Israel, sirens sounded in the Ashdod area and the Israeli military said five rockets were fired from southern Gaza. No injuries were reported. Hamas said the rocket fire was in response to Israeli “genocide against civilians.”
Israel ready to escalate tensions
Israel is preparing for a serious de-escalation after the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on Wednesday, while Fuad Shukr, the top military commander of the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, was killed in an Israeli attack in Beirut a day earlier.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was scheduled to hold special security discussions late Sunday following threats of retaliation from Iran and Hezbollah, a defense official said.
Defense Minister Yoav Galant said he was reviewing plans “that would impose a cost in the event of attempts by Iran and its allies to attack Israel.”
“Our preparedness in terms of defence is at a high level – whether it is on the ground or in the air, and we are prepared for both quick reaction or attack. If they dare to attack us, they will pay a heavy price,” Gallant said in a statement.
Both Hamas and Iran have accused Israel of killing Haniyeh and have vowed to retaliate. Israel has neither claimed nor denied responsibility for the killing.
Like Hamas, Hezbollah is also supported by Iran and has also vowed revenge after Shukr’s killing.
According to Israeli figures, the war began on October 7 with a Hamas attack on southern Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and 250 were taken hostage to Gaza.
At least 39,550 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli military operation in Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, although the ministry does not distinguish between combatants and civilians.
Palestinian health officials say most of the deaths have been civilians. Israel, which has lost about 330 soldiers in Gaza, says about a third of the Palestinians killed were fighters.
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