Gaza: deadly Israeli raid on a school, Hezbollah member killed in Lebanon

The Israeli army carried out the attack. new deadly strikes in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, one of which provoked the death of 16 people in a school housing displaced people according to Hamas, and killed a Hezbollah member in a drone attack in neighboring Lebanon.

Israel indicated that its air force had targeted “several terrorists” “in the area of ​​the al-Jaouni school” in Nousseirat (center), managed by the UN and sheltering displaced people. “This location served as a hideout and operational infrastructure from which attacks were carried out against soldiers,” the army said.

As the war in Gaza entered its 10th month on Sunday, the Hamas government which rules the Palestinian territory had just announced that 16 people had been killed in a strike Israeli on this school.

At the same time, diplomatic efforts were relaunched with a view to a ceasefire and the release of hostages held in Gaza, with Israel announcing the sending a delegation next week to continue talks with the Qatari mediators.

Children crying after an Israeli strike, at the al-Jaouni school in Nousseirat, managed by the UN and housing displaced people in central Gaza, July 6, 2024 © AFP – Eyad BABA

The war was sparked by an unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement in southern Israel on October 7, which resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on data official. Of the 251 people kidnapped, 116 are still being held in Gaza, of whom 42 are dead, according to the Israeli army.

Israel has sworn to destroy Hamas, which it classifies as a terrorist organization like the United States and the European Union. Its military offensive on Palestinian territory killed 38,098, mostly civilians, according to data Saturday from the Hamas government's Health Ministry.

Palestinians inspect the damage caused by an Israeli strike in the Nusseirat refugee camp, in the central Gaza Strip, July 6, 2024 © AFP – Eyad BABA

In the small strip of devastated land, where Israel is besieging some 2.4 million people in conditions deemed “disastrous” by the UN, there is a shortage of water and food. According to the United Nations, 80% of the population is displaced and several residents, including children, have died of malnutrition.

– “Massacre” –

The Hamas government denounced the strike on the al-Jaouni school as a “heinous massacre”, also reporting 50 injured people transferred to hospital. According to him, 7,000 displaced people were in the school.

“Shrapnel reached me when I was in a class, the children were injured,” Samah Abou Amsha told AFP at the school. “Where should we go? Our children are scared to death.”

Earlier, rescuers reported 10 people killed, including three local journalists, by a strike on a house in the Nousseirat camp. A fourth journalist was killed in Gaza City (north), according to the Hamas press office.

Rescuers and civilians remove the body of a man from under rubble after an Israeli strike on the Nusseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, July 6, 2024 © AFP – Eyad BABA

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Fighting also continued in Shujaiya, an eastern neighborhood of Gaza City, where soldiers have been carrying out a ground operation supported by aircraft since June 27.

The sector is one of those in the Palestinian territory where the Israeli army has again intervened, after claiming to control them.

She said she killed “Hamas terrorists” and destroyed “weapons and infrastructure” including tunnels, accusing “the enemy of seeking to re-establish a base” in the neighborhood.< /p>

Soldiers are also fighting in Rafah (south), where witnesses reported heavy artillery fire in the center of the city. According to the army “terrorist cells were eliminated” and “several tunnels destroyed and weapons seized”.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) claimed that two of its employees had been killed in al-Bureij (center) without further details.

Majed-al-Imari, a 32-year-old Palestinian displaced amputee after injuries during the ongoing conflict in Gaza, fixes a prosthesis in a tent in Deir-al-Balah, in the central Gaza Strip, July 6, 2024 © AFP – EYAD BABA

The war threatens to take on a regional dimension with daily exchanges of fire between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah on both sides of the border.

A “local leader” of the powerful pro-Iranian movement, ally of Hamas, was killed by an Israeli drone attack on a vehicle near Baalbek, in eastern Lebanon some 100 km from the border, according to a close source of Hezbollah.

The Israeli army confirmed that it “operated in the Baalbek area to strike and eliminate… a key operative in the Hezbollah air defense unit Hezbollah”, having according to her “participated in the planning and execution of numerous terrorist attacks” against Israel and helped to constitute the group's “arsenal of Iranian weapons”.

– New demonstration in Tel-Aviv –

Palestinians inspect the damage caused by an Israeli strike on a house in the Nusseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on July 6, 2024. © AFP – Eyad BABA

In this context, new efforts are underway for a ceasefire in Gaza, in the run-up to a visit to the United States by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who is due to address to Congress on July 24.

Following talks on Friday in Doha with the head of the Israeli Mossad, David Barnea, a team will continue negotiations in Qatar “next week”, Mr Netanyahu's office said.

He reported persistent “gaps” with Hamas, which for its part announced new “ideas”.

Demonstration organized in Tel Aviv by relatives of Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip, July 5, 2024 © AFP – JACK GUEZ

The mediation efforts led by Qatar, the United States and Egypt have so far come up against the demands of both camps.

Benjamin Netanyahu says he wants to continue the war until the destruction of Hamas and the release of all the hostages, Hamas for its part demanding a definitive ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza before an agreement.

“It is important that an agreement is found” for the return of the hostages, pleaded one of them them, Almog Meir Jan, released at the beginning of June in an army operation, in a message broadcast during a new rally in Tel Aviv in the evening against the Netanyahu government.

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