Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli strikes on Friday killed at least seven people, including five at a school-turned-shelter in the Palestinian territory’s north.
“Five martyrs and others injured in an Israeli strike on Halima al-Saadia School, which was sheltering displaced persons in Jabalia al-Nazla, northern Gaza,” the agency said in a brief statement.
Nearly all of Gaza’s population has been displaced at least once during the more than 21-month war, which has created dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people living there.
Many have sought shelter in school buildings, but these have repeatedly come under Israeli attacks that the military often says target Hamas militants hiding among civilians.
The civil defence agency also reported two people killed in separate strikes in Gaza City and the southern city of Khan Yunis.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, which has recently expanded its military operations across Gaza.
Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency and other parties.
A Palestinian speaking to AFP from southern Gaza on condition of anonymity said there were ongoing attacks and widespread devastation, with Israeli tanks seen near Khan Yunis.
“The situation remains extremely difficult in the area — intense gunfire, intermittent air strikes, artillery shelling and ongoing bulldozing and destruction of displacement camps and agricultural land to the south, west and north of Al-Maslakh,” an area to Khan Yunis’s south, said the witness.
Israel’s military said in a statement that its soldiers were operating in the area, dismantling “terrorist infrastructure sites, both above and below ground” and seizing “weapons and military equipment”.
It also said that troops had killed earlier this week two members of Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian armed group which has fought alongside Hamas in Gaza.
The military statement said the two dead include an Islamic Jihad commander in Gaza City whom it accused of being part Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that sparked the war.
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