(Jerusalem) An Israeli strike on an area of the Gaza Strip where Palestinians displaced by the war between Israel and Hamas live has killed at least 40 people and wounded 60 others, authorities said Tuesday.
The Palestinian news agency WAFA reported the death toll from the strike, citing medical officials, and suggested the figures could change.
Details of the strike in the coastal community of Mawasi, just west of Khan Younis, which the Israeli military has designated as a humanitarian zone, remain unclear. The area is home to many Palestinians displaced by the war in which the Israeli military devastated the entire Gaza Strip after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7.
The Israeli military described the strike as hitting “senior Hamas terrorists operating in a command and control center,” without immediately providing further evidence.
Hamas denied in a statement that this was the case, although Israel has long accused Hamas and other militants of hiding among civilian populations.
Images circulating on social media showed deep craters at the site of the attack, with ruins scattered around it covered in shredded tents, a bicycle and other debris. Rescuers used shovels to dig through the sand. Passersby dug with their hands, illuminated by cellphone lights. At least one crater at the site appeared to be 10 meters deep.
The Israeli military said it used “precise munitions, aerial surveillance and additional means” that it did not immediately describe to limit civilian casualties.
The Gaza Health Ministry says more than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war began. It does not distinguish between fighters and civilians in its count. The war has caused widespread destruction and displaced about 90 percent of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million, often multiple times.
Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in their October 7 attack. They kidnapped another 250 and are still holding about 100 after freeing most of the rest in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel during a weeklong ceasefire last November. About a third of the remaining hostages are believed to be dead.
The U.N. agency responsible for helping displaced Palestinians said the Israeli military blocked a convoy for more than eight hours on Monday, despite coordinating with troops.
The agency’s director, Philippe Lazzarini, said the detained staff members were trying to work on a polio vaccination campaign in northern Gaza and Gaza City.
“The convoy was stopped at gunpoint just after the Wadi Gaza checkpoint with threats of detention of UN personnel,” he wrote on the social network X. “Bulldozers caused heavy damage to the UN armored vehicles.”
He said the staff and convoy then returned to a U.N. base, but it was unclear whether a polio vaccination campaign would take place in northern Gaza on Tuesday.
“UN personnel must be allowed to carry out their duties in safety and be protected at all times, in accordance with international humanitarian law,” he said. “Gaza is no different.”
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The vaccination campaign, launched after doctors discovered the first case of polio in the Palestinian enclave in 25 years, aims to inoculate 640,000 children during a war that has destroyed the health system.