An Israeli military official told the BBC that a deadly attack on a five-storey residential building in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza, took place on Tuesday after “spotters” were seen on the rooftop monitoring Israeli troops with binoculars. said that he had done so.
Gaza’s health ministry, controlled by Hamas, said more than 90 Palestinians, including 25 children, were killed or missing under the rubble of buildings that collapsed as a result of the attack.
Military officials said this was not a planned attack and the military had no knowledge that the building was being used as a shelter for displaced people.
It also said there were discrepancies between the reported casualties and the numbers observed by the military.
The attack prompted a strong reaction from the United States, Israel’s closest ally, which called for an explanation, calling it “a horrific incident with horrific consequences.”
On Wednesday, after military officials spoke to reporters, U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Israel was “not doing enough to get us the answers we requested.”
"They have told us what they have said publicly, that they are looking into this matter,” he added.
Israel does not allow the BBC or other international media into Gaza to report independently, and relies on information from video footage and eyewitness accounts, making it difficult to verify facts on the ground.
Videos posted on social media hours after the strike showed bodies wrapped in blankets and people collecting body parts at the strike site.
Umm Malik Abu Nasr later told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Today program on Tuesday that his family’s home was destroyed in the strike and that he was one of the survivors pulled from the rubble.
“Around 12:30 or 1 a.m., the Aouda family’s house next door to ours was bombed,” she said. “We rushed to help them and took them in, but their daughter (died) in our home.”
“At 4am, the Abu Nasr family’s high-rise building collapsed on us. They (Israeli forces) bombed the house where about 300 refugees lived who had fled from their homes. People tried to take shelter in our homes. We accepted them because they were just civilians and had no connection to the resistance.”
“My husband and other young people are still under the rubble and have not been pulled out yet,” she added. “My husband’s cousin and five children are still under the rubble.”
The director of nearby Kamal Adwan Hospital, which has two doctors and a limited number of nursing staff following last week’s Israeli attack, said in a recorded voice message on Tuesday that the 25 people killed in the airstrike at the hospital He said he had received more bodies. Another 77 people were trapped under the rubble.
Dr. Hassam Abu Safiya added that around 45 injured people, including children and women, were also taken to the hospital by horse-drawn carriages or by hand.
Thor Wendsland, the United Nations special envoy for peace in the Middle East, said the incident was “a series of deadly mass casualties that have occurred in recent days, in tandem with large-scale evacuations in northern Gaza, raising grave concerns about violations of humanitarian law.” “This is the latest thing that is causing this,” he said.
Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed since Israeli forces launched ground attacks in Beit Lahia and neighboring Jabalia and Beit Hanun on October 6, allegedly acting against a regrouping of Hamas fighters. It is being
More than 70,000 residents have taken refuge in Gaza City, but the United Nations estimates that around 100,000 people remain in dire conditions with severe shortages of food, water and medical supplies.
The attack also forced the closure of essential services, including medical facilities, firefighting, search and rescue, wells, and bakeries.
Israel launched an operation to annihilate Hamas in response to Hamas’s unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, which left approximately 1,200 people dead and 251 hostages taken.
More than 43,160 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-controlled region’s health ministry.
