The Israeli military pressed ahead with its offensive in central Gaza on Friday, saying it had killed dozens of militants, including some who had taken refuge on the premises of a former United Nations school that had been converted into a shelter in the zone.
The army said it had attacked Hamas fighters at a school compound in Shati, a coastal neighborhood northwest of central Gaza City. The number of victims was unclear.
“Hamas systematically, intentionally and strategically places its infrastructure and operates from within civilian areas in total violation of international law and putting the lives of Gazan civilians at risk,” the Israeli military said in a statement after the attack.
Friday’s attack came a day after an attack on a similar school complex nearby in Nuseirat, where displaced civilians had taken shelter. Gaza health authorities said those killed in that attack included women and children.
Israel on Friday offered a full defense of Thursday’s attack, saying its forces had attacked between 20 and 30 militants who it said were using three classrooms at the former school as a base.
The attacks on U.N. compounds in central Gaza reflect Israel’s painstaking efforts to pacify areas where officials had previously said Hamas had been largely repressed.
The number and identity of those killed in On Thursday, Nuseirat was still in dispute. The Gaza Health Ministry and officials at the hospital where the victims were taken have provided varying figures. And an assessment by the Israeli military offered a third explanation.
Palestinian officials have given death tolls ranging between 41 and 46. Yasser Khattab, an official who supervises the morgue at Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in nearby Deir al Balah, said 18 of the victims were children and nine were women.
The Israeli military on Friday released the names of eight more Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters it said were killed in the attack, adding to a list released Thursday and bringing the total number of suspected militants to 17 so far.
Later on Thursday, an Israeli airstrike on Nuseirat City Hall killed at least five people, including the mayor, Iyad al-Maghari. A video shared by Palestinian media showed numerous bodies on the floor of a morgue, including some who appeared to be children.
The death toll in all of these attacks could not be independently confirmed.
With 36,000 people dead in Gaza during the war between Israel and Hamas, according to Gaza health officials, the United Nations announced Friday that it would include Israel on a global list of criminals who commit violations harmful to children. Hamas was also on the list.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel condemned the report, saying in a statement that the country’s military “is the most moral military in the world, and no crazy U.N. decision will change that.”
Israeli troops also continued their offensive on Friday in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where the army has seized much of the border area with Egypt. The military said it was carrying out “targeted operations based on intelligence,” without providing further details.
The fighting occurred as U.S. officials continued to press for a ceasefire. The State Department announced Friday that Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken would travel next week to Egypt, Israel, Jordan and Qatar to push for an agreement.
Since fighting began, fueled by the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, Hamas and other Palestinian militants in Gaza have used an extensive labyrinth of underground tunnels to wage a guerrilla war, ambushing Israeli forces with booby traps . Israeli troops have returned to previously besieged areas such as Bureij in central Gaza in an effort to quell what the military says is a renewed Hamas insurgency there.
“We are seeing that Hamas still exists and that it still has capabilities above and below ground,” Peter Lerner, an Israeli military spokesman, told reporters Thursday, describing continued attacks by “smaller cells” of militants using rocket-propelled grenades. . small arms and booby traps.
On Thursday, Hamas militants emerged from a tunnel just a few hundred feet from Israeli territory in an attempt to attack inside the country, the Israeli military said. Israeli drone and tank fire targeted the militants, killing three of them, according to the army. An Israeli soldier was also killed in the shooting.
Since Israel’s military offensive in Rafah, the number of trucks carrying desperately needed international aid has decreased (despite an increase in commercial trucks) amid a humanitarian crisis that aid workers say remains dire. .
The U.S. military said Friday it had repositioned a pier designed to funnel humanitarian shipments to the enclave off the coast of Gaza. The $230 million floating dock, which U.S. officials have praised as part of a solution to bring more aid to the famine-stricken territory, broke up in stormy seas more than a week ago.
Farnaz Fassihi and Michael Crowley contributed reports.