Dozens killed in Israeli strikes, Gaza officials say

At least 28 people, including children, have been killed by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip, according to the Gaza Human Rights Watch.

Families being evacuated from schools were among the areas affected, killing eight people including four children over the weekend, the agency said.

This comes as the UN issues a call for Israel to stop airstrikes near a hospital in northern Gaza.

The Israeli military said the Hamas control center was inside the Musa bin Nusair school in Gaza City, and did not comment on the details of the attack on the hospital.

“Hamas is violating international law,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on TV, adding that Israel’s response would be “to take strong and decisive action against terrorist organizations”.

The spokesman for the Gaza Public Security Agency, Mahmoud Bassal, told AFP that the school had been turned into a refuge for Palestinians who fled their homes because of the war.

A refugee man who lives at the school, Abu, told BBC Arabic that the attack took place while he was sleeping.

“We were sleeping peacefully, then suddenly we woke up after hearing a very strong explosion,” he said.

A man named Mahmoud said he was sleeping in a tent in the school yard when the attack took place.

“Stones and statues were flying, the walls of the school fell on our heads,” he told BBC Arabic.

On Sunday, Pope Francis condemned Israel’s attack on Gaza for the second day in a row.

He expressed pain at the thought of “such atrocities, shooting children with machine guns, blowing up schools and hospitals”.

The head of Kamal Adwan Hospital, Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, said his generators had been hit and said the Israeli army was looking for a fuel tank.

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, pleaded with the IDF to stop the attack near the hospital.

Saturday night’s reports of “a bomb blast near Kamal Adwan’s hospital and calls for him to leave the hospital are deeply disturbing,” he said in a social media statement.

“We call for an end to the fighting near the hospital and to protect patients and medical staff.”

The head of the hospital also issued a statement saying that the Israeli army is treating the hospital “as if we were an army”.

“Anyone who steps outside the hospital is at risk of being beaten,” said Dr Hussam Abu Safiya.

He said that moving the hospital’s surgeries would harm patients, and called for medical staff to “be allowed to work without the threat of leaving”.

Israel has not responded to reports of displacement.

The BBC has approached the IDF for comment.

Palestinian groups involved in the conflict have told the BBC that ceasefire agreement ‘closer than ever’.

More than 45,000 Palestinians have been killed during the 14-month war between Israel and Hamas, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.

The war began when terrorist groups led by Hamas attacked southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which nearly 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were captured.