DEIR EL-BALAH – An Israeli strike on a school where displaced people were sheltering in the central Gaza Strip killed at least 17 people on Thursday, nearly all women and children, Palestinian medical officials said.
The strike came as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Israel had accomplished its objective of “effectively dismantling” Hamas, and that negotiations over a cease-fire and the release of dozens of Israeli hostages would resume “in the coming days.”
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Another 42 people were wounded in the strike in the built-up Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the Awda Hospital, which received the casualties. Among the dead were 13 children under the age of 18 and three women, according to the hospital's records.
The Israeli military said it targeted Hamas militants inside the school, without providing evidence. Israel has carried out strikes on several schools-turned-shelters in recent months, saying it precisely targets militants hiding out among civilians. The strikes often kill women and children.
New talks in Qatar planned
Blinken, speaking to reporters in Qatar, which has served as a key mediator between Israel and Hamas, said negotiators would return to Doha to renew the talks.
“What we really have to determine is whether Hamas is prepared to engage,” Blinken said on his 11th visit to the region since the start of the war.
Hamas’s political representatives have not so far signaled a softer stance.
“There is no change in our position,” senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan told Al Mayadeen, a Lebanese broadcaster seen as closely aligned with Iran and its allies.
Hamdan said Hamas delegates heard from mediators in Cairo about the potential to revive cease-fire negotiations but reiterated that the group still insists on an end to Israel’s offensive in Gaza, as well as its complete withdrawal from the territory.
The Israeli prime minister’s office said the head of the Mossad, the country's spy agency, would travel to Qatar on Sunday to meet with CIA director Bill Burns and the Qatari prime minister.
The United States hoped to revive the negotiations after Israeli forces killed top Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza last week, but neither side has shown signs of moderating its demands from months of negotiations that sputtered to a halt over the summer.
Blinken also announced an additional $135 million in U.S. aid to the Palestinians, while again urging Israel to allow more assistance to enter the territory.
Supplies run low in northern Gaza
Health workers in besieged northern Gaza meanwhile warned of a catastrophic situation there, where Israel has been waging an air and ground offensive for over two weeks.
Hundreds of people have been killed and tens of thousands have fled their homes in northern Gaza in recent days. The military says it is battling Hamas fighters who regrouped in the north, which was one of the first targets of the ground offensive at the start of the war.
Dr. Hossam Abu Safiyeh, the director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in the north, said in a video message released Wednesday that some 150 wounded people were being treated there, including 14 children in intensive care or the neonatal department.
“There is a very large number of wounded people, and we lose at least one person every hour because of the lack of medical supplies and medical staff,” he said.
“Our ambulances can’t transfer wounded people,” he said. “Those who can arrive by themselves to the hospital receive care, but those who don’t just die in the streets.”
Footage shared with The Associated Press shows medical staff tending to premature babies and several older children in hospital beds, some with severe burns. One child is seen attached to a breathing machine, with bandages on her face and flies hovering over her.
“We are providing the bare minimum to patients. Everyone is paying the price of what is happening now in northern Gaza,” Abu Safiyeh said.
Kamal Adwan is one of three hospitals in the north left largely inaccessible because of the fighting. The war has gutted the health system across Gaza, with only 16 of 39 hospitals even partially functioning, according to the World Health Organization.
In another one of the besieged hospitals in Gaza’s northernmost end, the Indonesian Hospital, patients say they're struggling to stay alive in the face of power outages and shortages of food, water and medical supplies.
“The pain is horrible, but there are no painkillers here, no antibiotics," said 39-year-old Nidal al-Darini, whose foot, wounded in an Israeli airstrike, has become infected. “It's becoming unbearable."
First responders halt operations after saying Israel fired on them
The Civil Defense, first responders who operate under the Hamas-run government, said they had suspended operations in the north. They said Israeli forces fired on one of their teams in the town of Beit Lahiya after ordering them to relocate to the Indonesian Hospital, where troops are stationed.
Three Civil Defense members were wounded in the strike, and a firetruck was destroyed, it said. It said another five of its personnel were detained by Israeli forces at the hospital.
“As a result, we declare that Civil Defense operations in the northern Gaza Strip have been completely halted, leaving these areas without any firefighting, rescue, or emergency medical services,” it said in a statement.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the allegations.
The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting another 250. Around 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed over 42,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry, which does not say how many were combatants but says women and children make up more than half the fatalities. The Israeli military says it has killed over 17,000 fighters, without providing evidence.
The war has displaced around 90% of Gaza's population of 2.3 million, often multiple times. Hundreds of thousands of people are crammed into tent camps along the coast after entire neighborhoods in many areas were pounded to rubble.
Meanwhile the Israeli campaign has expanded to Lebanon, where Israel launched a ground invasion over three weeks ago after trading fire with the Hezbollah militant group for much of the past year.
Lebanese health officials reported another day of intense airstrikes and shelling Thursday, which they said killed 19 people over the last 24 hours and raised the overall Lebanese death toll to 2,593 since the conflict started in October 2023.
The Israeli military on Thursday announced the deaths of four reservists who were killed the day before in combat in southern Lebanon, making Wednesday one of the deadliest days for Israel in Lebanon since it launched its ground invasion on Sept. 30.
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Amiri reported from Doha, Qatar, and Khaled reported from Cairo. Associated Press writers Samy Magdy in Cairo and Isabel DeBre in Buenos Aires, Argentina, contributed.
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Follow AP’s war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war