UN workers killed in Israeli strike

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees says six of its staff members were killed on Wednesday in an Israeli airstrike on a school being used as a shelter for displaced people in central Gaza.

Airstrikes conducted overnight by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in the enclave also hit two homes and killed at least 34 people, including 19 women and children, AP reported, citing hospital officials.

“Six colleagues killed today when two airstrikes hit a school and its surroundings in Nuseirat in the middle areas,” the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) said in a post on X (formerly Twitter), adding that the attack had resulted in the highest death toll among its staff in a single incident.

The same school has been hit five times since the launch of Israel’s military operation in Gaza in response to a cross-border incursion by Hamas on October 7, according to the agency. It said the building was sheltering around 12,000 displaced civilians, most of whom were women and children.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the “unacceptable” attacks in a post on X, calling for an end to violations of international humanitarian law.

In response, Israel’s ambassador to the UN accused the secretary-general of distorting reality, claiming that it was “unconscionable that the UN continues to condemn Israel in its just war against terrorists, while Hamas continues to use women and children as human shields.”

The IDF has struck several school buildings in recent months, claiming that Palestinian militants were hiding at the locations among displaced civilians. Hamas has repeatedly denied the accusations.

Israel’s military previously said it had conducted a “precise strike” on Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist operatives at a command center located within the Israeli-designated humanitarian zone in central Gaza. The statement did not elaborate on the exact outcome, but said “numerous steps” had been taken to reduce the risk to civilians.

Over the past 11 months, the hostilities triggered by the Hamas-led incursion have claimed the lives of nearly 41,100 Palestinians, with more than 95,000 others wounded in airstrikes and the ground offensive, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.