Israeli attack on Gaza school kills at least 28, including children

Gaza, Agencies: At least 28 Palestinians, including children, have been killed in an Israeli strike on yet another school-turned-shelter in the northern Gaza Strip, a health official has said, as Israeli forces press on with their ground assault in the area, reports Al Jazeera. Thursday’s attack on the ravaged area, which has been besieged for nearly two weeks following a renewed Israeli ground offesnsive, wounded 160 others, according to Palestinian health official, Medhat Abbas. “There is no water to extinguish the fire. There is nothing. This is a massacre,” Abbas said. “Civilians and children are being killed, burned under fire.”

The Israeli military, without substantial evidence, said the strike targeted fighters from Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad groups. It claimed the fighters operated from within the Abu Hussein School in Jabalia that had been serving as a shelter for displaced people. Hamas strongly denied the claim that it was using the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA)-run school for fighting purposes and said in a statement that the allegations were “nothing but lies”, adding this was “a systematic policy of the enemy to justify its crime”.