Deadly twin strikes on Gaza hospital targeted ‘Hamas cameras’: Israel
Israeli military issues statement as part of its initial inquiry into the attack, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called a “tragic mishap”
A deadly Israeli strike on a Gaza hospital that killed 20 people, including five journalists, was targeting what the military believed was a Hamas surveillance camera, as well as people identified as militants, the Israeli military said on Tuesday (August 26).
The military issued the statement as part of its initial inquiry into the attack, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called a “tragic mishap”.
The military said the back-to-back strikes on southern Gaza’s largest hospital were ordered because soldiers believed militants were using the camera to observe Israeli forces and because Israel has long believed Hamas and other militant groups are present at hospitals, though Israeli officials rarely provide evidence.
Also read: Israel has a pattern of silencing Palestinian media stretching back to 1967
Outrage over twin hospital strikes
The military’s chief of general staff acknowledged several “gaps” in the investigation so far, including the kind of ammunition used to take out the camera.
The initial investigation’s findings emerged amid a surge of outrage as international leaders and rights groups condemned the strikes. Protesters in Israel set tires ablaze, blocked highways and clamoured for a ceasefire that would free hostages still in Gaza, even as Israeli leaders moved forward with plans for an offensive which they argue is needed to defeat Hamas.
Meanwhile, Palestinians in Gaza braced for the expanded offensive against a backdrop of displacement, destruction and parts of the territory plunging into famine. The deadly strikes a day earlier killed medics and journalists.
Also read: Israel’s strikes on Gaza hospital kill journos, rescuers; Netanyahu calls it ‘mishap’
Netanyahu’s expanded offensive
Netanyahu has said that Israel will launch an expanded offensive in Gaza City while simultaneously pursuing a ceasefire, though Israel has yet to send a negotiating team to discuss a proposal on the table. Netanyahu has said the offensive is the best way to weaken Hamas and return hostages, but hostage families and their supporters have pushed back.
Calls for a ceasefire continued a day after the hospital strikes that killed at least the journalists and 15 others. The strike, among the deadliest of the war against both journalists and hospitals, sparked shock and outrage among press freedom advocates and Palestinians, who mourned the dead at funerals on Monday.
Most of those killed died after rushing to the scene of the first blast, only to be hit by a second strike — an attack captured on television by several networks.
The strike happened as Israel prepared to expand its offensive into densely populated areas of northern Gaza. Israel’s military wants people in hospitals, displacement camps and Gaza City neighbourhoods to evacuate southward to so-called safe zones so it can destroy Hamas and prevent attacks like the October 7, 2023, assault that killed about 1,200 people and triggered the war.
Also read: Patients' physical state flags severe malnutrition, say doctors in Gaza
A day after the strike, Israeli strikes killed at least 16 Palestinians on Tuesday, hospitals said.
Officials from Nasser Hospital, Shifa Hospital and Gaza City’s Sheikh Radwan clinic reported that among the 16 were families, women and children.
More starvation deaths
Gaza’s Health Ministry also said on Tuesday that three more adults died of causes related to malnutrition and starvation, bringing the malnutrition-related death toll to 186 since late June, when the ministry started to count fatalities among this age category. The toll includes 117 children since the start of the war.
Israel’s military offensive has killed 62,819, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many were fighters or civilians but says around half were women and children.
In a rare daytime raid on one of the largest Palestinian cities in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, lines of Israeli military vehicles entered downtown Ramallah on Tuesday afternoon. The Israeli military acknowledged an ongoing operation in the city but did not provide any information about the purpose of the raid.
Also read: Israeli strikes kill 25 in Gaza; famine declared in Gaza City
Ramallah is the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority, which cooperates with Israel on security and has been largely sidelined since the start of the war.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said there were 58 injuries during the raid, including injuries from live fire, rubber bullets, tear gas inhalation, and “live bullet shrapnel.” Israeli armoured vehicles entered a busy downtown intersection in the city, stopping traffic. A few dozen people attempted to throw rocks at the military vehicles.
The war in Gaza has sparked a surge of violence in the West Bank, with the Israeli military carrying out large-scale operations targeting militants that have killed hundreds of Palestinians and displaced tens of thousands.
(With agency inputs)