An Israeli airstrike on a hospital courtyard in Gaza this morning has killed at least four people and led to a fire that swept through a refugee camp, hours after an Israeli airstrike also killed five children while they were playing in the Al-Shati refugee camp.
On Sunday, a Hezbollah drone attack on an army base killed four Israeli soldiers while wounding more than 60 others reports say.
Associated Press reported that the fire that followed the Israeli airstrike on a tent camp for displaced persons in the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central city of Deir al-Bala also left “more than two dozen with severe burns, according to Palestinian medics”.
AP added that “the Israeli military said it targeted militants hiding out among civilians, without providing evidence. In recent months it has repeatedly struck crowded shelters and tent camps, alleging that Hamas fighters were using them as staging grounds for attacks”.
Dozens were injured after an Israeli strike on the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Gaza.
— Sky News (@SkyNews) October 14, 2024
The Israeli army said it conducted a 'precise' strike on Hamas militants in Deir al-Balah ⬇️ https://t.co/7vn47yznG5 pic.twitter.com/qqV34xgvz1
On the airstrike at the Al-Shati refugee camp, Palestinian news agency WAFA said five children were playing near a café when they were killed by a missile fired from an Israeli drone, BBC reported.
Graphic images from the scene in the aftermath show the bloodied bodies of what appeared to be young teenage boys.
One of them looked to be clutching several glass marbles in his hand.
According to a report from the scene, told to a BBC correspondent, a drone strike hit a person walking down the street, which killed the children and injured seven other people.
Later images showed the bodies of the five boys wrapped in white shrouds and laid out on the floor side-by-side.
An aunt of one of the boys, named Rami, wrote a moving tribute to him on social media. She said the family had moved to al-Shati after being forced to leave their homes in Jabalia to a “safer area” because of the war.
Yesterday, a drone attack by Hezbollah on an army base in central Israel killed four soldiers and wounded more than 60 others, CNN reported describing it as “one of the bloodiest attacks on Israel since the beginning of the war last October”.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said an unmanned aerial vehicle, or UAV, launched by Hezbollah hit an army base adjacent to Binyamina, a town north of Tel Aviv that lies some 40 miles from the Lebanese border.
The four killed soldiers were all 19 years old and in infantry training at the base, the IDF said, adding that eight other soldiers were severely injured.
According to Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service, a total of 61 people were wounded in the attack, with dozens still hospitalized.
The news comes after Hezbollah said Sunday it had fired a swarm of attack drones on an Israeli infantry training camp in Binyamina. The Lebanon-based militant group said the attack was in response to deadly Israeli strikes in Lebanon Thursday.
Conflict has escalated between Hezbollah and Israel since the war in Gaza began.
Meanwhile, Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen accused the United Nations’ UNIFIL peacekeepers in south Lebanon of being a “useless” force that failed to protect Israelis from Hezbollah attacks and called on it to withdraw.
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, also called for Unifil troops to evacuate. “The time has come for you to withdraw Unifil from Hezbollah strongholds and from the combat zones,” he said. “The IDF has requested this repeatedly and has met with repeated refusal, which has the effect of providing Hezbollah terrorists with human shields.”
“Israel will make every effort to prevent Unifil casualties and will do what it takes to win the war,” he later added.