At least ten Palestinians, including six children, were killed in an Israeli airstrike in central Gaza on Sunday while waiting to collect water, according to emergency service officials.
Their bodies were taken to al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat, which also treated 16 injured people, including seven children, a hospital doctor confirmed.
Witnesses reported that a drone launched a missile at a group gathered with empty containers beside a water tanker in the al-Nuseirat refugee camp. The Israeli military has been approached for comment.
Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said its field hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza, had handled more mass casualty cases in the past six weeks than in the previous year.
Footage shared online, which has not been independently verified, showed graphic scenes of bloodied children and bodies lying motionless, amid frantic cries and chaos. Locals rushed to help the injured, using private cars and donkey carts for transport.
The strike occurred amid intensified Israeli aerial assaults throughout the Gaza Strip. Gaza’s Civil Defence Agency reported 19 more deaths on Sunday from three separate strikes targeting residential buildings in central Gaza and Gaza City.
Taka gains strength as dollar rate falls by nearly Tk 3
The ICRC said its Rafah facility received 132 patients with weapon-related injuries on Saturday, 31 of whom died. Most patients had gunshot wounds, and those who could speak said they had been trying to reach food distribution points.
Since new food distribution sites opened on 27 May, the hospital has treated over 3,400 weapon-wounded individuals and recorded more than 250 deaths—surpassing all mass casualty cases seen there in the previous year.
"The alarming frequency and scale of these mass casualty incidents underscore the horrific conditions civilians in Gaza are enduring," the ICRC stated.
On Friday, the UN human rights office reported 789 aid-related deaths. Among them, 615 occurred near sites operated by the US- and Israeli-supported Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which began functioning on 27 May inside military zones in southern and central Gaza. Another 183 deaths were recorded near UN and other aid convoys.
The Israeli military acknowledged that civilian casualties have occurred and said it is working to minimise "possible friction between the population and the [Israeli] forces as much as possible".
In response, the GHF accused the UN of citing "false and misleading" data from Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry. GHF leader Johnnie Moore previously told the BBC he did not deny deaths near their aid locations but insisted, “100% of those casualties are being attributed to close proximity to GHF and that is not true.”
On Saturday, Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza reported 24 deaths near a food distribution point. Witnesses claimed Israeli troops had fired on civilians trying to collect food. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said there were “no known injured individuals” from IDF fire, though a military official stated warning shots were used to disperse people perceived as threats.
International news outlets, including the BBC, are not permitted to enter Gaza by Israel.
Israel launched its ongoing military offensive following Hamas's attack on 7 October 2023, in which around 1,200 Israelis were killed and 251 taken hostage.
According to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, at least 57,882 people have been killed in the territory since then. Most of the population has been displaced multiple times, with over 90% of homes believed to be damaged or destroyed.
Gaza's basic infrastructure has collapsed, leading to severe shortages of food, fuel, medicine, and shelter. The UN said 75,000 litres of fuel were delivered this week for the first time in 130 days—"far from enough to meet the daily needs of the population and vital civilian aid operations".
On Saturday, nine UN agencies warned that the fuel shortage in Gaza had reached "critical levels", threatening the operation of hospitals, water and sanitation systems, and bakeries.
"Hospitals are already going dark, maternity, neonatal and intensive care units are failing, and ambulances can no longer move," the UN said.
Source: With input from BBC