At least 12 individuals have been killed after Israel focused a United Nations shelter for internally displaced Palestinians in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis.
Some 75 others had been additionally injured when the constructing within the metropolis of Khan Younis was hit by two tank shells the day past, Gaza director of U.N. company for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) Thomas White mentioned on Thursday.
A fireplace then broke out within the middle, the place 1000’s of internally displaced individuals had sought shelter. The facility had been used as a U.N. vocational coaching middle for younger Palestinians.
The head of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, condemned the assault and mentioned the quantity lifeless was more likely to rise.
“Once again a blatant disregard of basic rules of war,” Lazzarini mentioned on X.
He added that the compound had been clearly marked as a U.N. facility and its coordinates shared with Israeli authorities, with out specifying accountability for the shelling.
When requested in regards to the incident, the Israeli military instructed AFP it had “ruled out that this incident is a result of an aerial or artillery strike by the IDF (army).”
“A thorough review of the operations of the forces in the vicinity is underway,” the military mentioned.
Teams from UNRWA and the World Health Organization (WHO) had been attempting to achieve the shelter, which has been blocked for 2 days, White mentioned.
U.N. officers gave completely different figures of the variety of individuals sheltering on the facility, with Lazzarini saying 30,000 displaced individuals had been there.
Footage aired on Al Jazeera Arabic confirmed fireplace raging and thick plumes of smoke rising out of the constructing.
The United States mentioned it “deplored” Wednesday’s assault.
“We deplore today’s attack on the UN’s Khan Younis training center,” State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel mentioned.
“You’ve heard me say it before, you’ve heard the Secretary say it before, but civilians must be protected and the protected nature of U.N. facilities must be respected,” Patel instructed reporters.
Pressed on whether or not the United States was in touch with Israel in regards to the assault, Patel declined to enter the main points of the conversations, however mentioned: “We intend to continue to have these conversations with the Israeli government and raise these very tough and difficult situations.”
“Humanitarian workers must be protected so that they can continue providing civilians with the lifesaving humanitarian assistance that they need,” mentioned Patel.
Khan Younis pummeled
Despite the outcry, Israel on Thursday stepped up its assault within the Gazan metropolis of Khan Younis, with the Palestinian resistance group Hamas saying dozens had been killed in heavy bombardment and concrete fight.
The Israeli military says it has “encircled” Khan Younis, the hometown of Hamas’s Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar, accused of being the mastermind of the Oct. 7 incursion that sparked the battle.
Hamas, which has dominated Gaza since 2007, reported fierce clashes within the middle and west of town, the place combating has been inching nearer to hospitals sheltering 1000’s of displaced individuals.
Its Health Ministry mentioned not less than 50 individuals had been killed in Khan Younis over the previous 24 hours. The military mentioned a number of resistance members had been killed in “close-quarters combat” within the metropolis, and that strikes additionally focused resistance teams in central and northern Gaza.
At Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, the scene of a few of the heaviest combating, AFPTV footage confirmed graves with the names of these buried scrawled on them in crayon amid debris-strewn streets and pockmarked buildings.
“Those look like graves, but they are not proper ones,” mentioned Ahmad Abdul Salam, a resident of town’s Al-Maghazi refugee camp. “We buried whole families, who were wiped out, inside these mass graves.”
The conflict erupted when Hamas and different resistance teams from Gaza launched the unprecedented Oct. 7 incursion of Israel which claimed about 1,140 lives.
They additionally seized 250 hostages, and Israel says round 132 stay in Gaza. That quantity contains the our bodies of not less than 28 lifeless hostages, in keeping with an AFP tally based mostly on Israeli figures.
Israel in response launched a relentless navy offensive that has killed not less than 25,700 individuals, about 70% of them girls and youngsters.
Source: www.dailysabah.com