Gaza’s Civil Defense announced on Saturday the deaths of eleven people, including women and children, in an overnight Israeli airstrike on a house in Gaza City that was sheltering Palestinians displaced by the war.
“We have recovered the bodies of eleven martyrs, including four children and three women, after an Israeli warplane carried out a strike on a three-story house belonging to the Boustane family,” Civil Defense spokesperson Mahmoud Bassal told AFP.
“Without prior warning”
He explained that the strike occurred around 1:00 AM on Saturday (10:00 PM GMT Friday) near Shuja’iyya School in the Al-Tuffah neighborhood, east of Gaza City.
“Several families had taken refuge in the house, which was targeted by a single missile without any prior warning,” the spokesperson added, noting that many others were injured.
“The search continues for those still missing,” he added.
The Israeli army confirmed carrying out an overnight strike, stating that Israeli forces had targeted the “commander” of a Hamas cell in the Daraj Tuffah area, who was “involved in planning and executing terrorist activities.” It said it was “aware of the allegations that several civilians were killed” in the strike.
The Civil Defense spokesperson in Gaza, devastated by more than eleven months of war between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, also reported that five more people were killed in Gaza City by an Israeli airstrike that hit a school converted into a shelter.
The Israeli army claimed it had targeted Hamas fighters.
In Gaza City, another Israeli airstrike caused the deaths of five people near a school, according to the Civil Defense.
In the southern part of the besieged territory, three more people were killed in a strike on the Al-Mawassi area in Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of Palestinians displaced by the war had taken refuge, according to the same source.
Katz calls Borrell an “anti-Semite”
On the diplomatic front, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz on Saturday called the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, an “anti-Semite” after Borrell said he was “shocked” by the deaths of UN employees in an Israeli strike in Gaza.
“Josep Borrell is an anti-Semite and a critic of Israel who constantly tries to pass resolutions and sanctions against Israel within the EU, only to be blocked by most member states,” the minister said in a statement.
On Thursday, Borrell criticized the “disregard for fundamental principles of international humanitarian law” following the deaths of 18 people on Wednesday in an Israeli strike on a school converted into a shelter in the center of the territory, according to Civil Defense.
Among the victims were six members of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).
With AFP.
