Israel forces hit Hamas fighters inside UN agency building
Military says militants were ‘operating inside UNRWA’s headquarters’
Israel forces hit Hamas fighters inside UN agency building
AFP
Daily TribuneMilitary says militants were ‘operating inside UNRWA’s headquarters’
Israel forces hit Hamas fighters inside UN agency building
AFP
Israeli forces launched more deadly strikes across Gaza on Wednesday, according to medical sources and the military, which said it targeted Hamas terrorists operating from inside a United Nations agency building.
The Israeli military said that one overnight attack in Gaza City targeted Hamas and Islamic Jihad targets operating from inside the headquarters of the UN agency for Palestinians UNRWA.
The UN agency has not had control of the building since October. Israeli forces said in February they had found a Hamas tunnel underneath the headquarters.
The military said the militants were “operating inside UNRWA’s headquarters in the area and using it as a base to conduct attacks on IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) troops in the central Gaza Strip.”
It said that militants had been “eliminated” and “large amounts of weapons” found.
UNRWA had no immediate comment on the attack, but has said it has “no way to verify” claims that its facilities are being used by Hamas and its allies.
Early on Wednesday, four people were killed and one critically wounded in the bombing of a house in the central town of Nuseirat, a hospital source told Agence France-Presse.
And two people were killed and six injured in another strike on a home in Bani Suhaila, near Khan Yunis, according to another hospital source.
School attack
The Israeli army also said it was reviewing an attack on Tuesday in which hospital sources said at least 29 people were killed in a nearby school in the southern Khan Yunis area — the fourth attack on a school building in four days.
Tuesday’s deadly strike near the Al-Awda school in Abasan, near Khan Yunis, brought new condemnation from Hamas over the Israeli military tactics.
The Hamas government said a “majority” of the dead were women and children.
The Israeli military said the air force had “struck a terrorist from Hamas’ military wing who took part, among other terrorist activities, in the 7 October brutal massacre” in southern Israel.
It was the fourth time in four days that Gaza school buildings sheltering the displaced had been hit.
Israel has stepped up air and ground attacks in Gaza City and southern Gaza since issuing evacuation orders for tens of thousands of people in the war-stricken Palestinian territory.
The heightened military strikes come as Israeli officials start talks in Qatar on Wednesday on reaching a truce in the war raging since the 7 October Hamas attacks.
Golan Heights
Israeli police said two people were killed Tuesday by rocket fire in the annexed Golan Heights, the latest victims of months of cross-border clashes between Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Israeli forces.
The Israeli military said that “approximately 40 projectiles crossed from Lebanon into the area of the central Golan Heights.