Israeli strike on Gaza school kills at least 100, Israel says Hamas targeted

An Israeli airstrike on a Gaza school compound housing displaced families, killed around 100 people, according to the Gaza government.

Israeli military said the attack targeted Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters operating there.

Video from the site showed bodies on the ground and more bodies being carried away and covered in blankets on the floor.  The Gaza government's media office said the strikes hit when people sheltering at the school were performing dawn prayers, leading to many casualties.

"So far, there are more than 93 martyrs, including 11 children and six women. There are unidentified remains," said spokesperson for the Palestinian Civil Defense, Mahmoud Bassal.

Around 6,000 people had been sheltering at the compound, he said. 

In a statement in Hebrew, the Israeli military said the death toll was inflated. It said around 20 Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters were operating at the site.

"The compound, and the mosque that was struck within it, served as an active Hamas and Islamic Jihad military facility," Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said on X.

'Israel genociding Palestinians'

Israel says Palestinian armed groups embed among Gaza's civilians, operating from within schools, hospitals and designated humanitarian zones - which Hamas and its allies deny.

Francesca Albanese, the UN's special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, has issued a statement condemning the world's "indifference" to mass bloodshed in Gaza following Saturday morning's attack on the al-Tabin school.

"Israel is genociding the Palestinians one neighborhood at the time, one hospital at the time, one school at the time, one refugee camp at the time, one 'safe zone' at the time," Albanese wrote on X.

"May the Palestinians forgive us for our collective inability to protect them, honoring the most basic meaning of international law."

Hamas has released a statement condemning Israel's attack on the school. 

"The massacre perpetrated in the Gaza Strip by the hands of the Neo-Nazis in the center of Gaza City constitutes a horrific crime and represents a grave escalation in the unprecedented series of crimes and massacres in the history of wars," their statement said.

In response to Israel's claims the school was being used as a Hamas command center, the group said that these justifications are false and "excuses to target civilians, schools, hospitals, and refugee tents, all of which are false pretexts and exposed lies to justify its crimes."

'Strewn with dead bodies'

"The school area is strewn with dead bodies and body parts," Gaza's Civil Defense spokesman, Mahmoud Basal, told Al Jazeera. "It is very difficult for paramedics to identify a whole dead body.  Medical teams stand helpless before this horrific scene."

Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought shelter in Gaza's schools, most of which have stopped functioning since the start of the war 10 months ago.

Gaza's Nuseirat camp also faced a heavy assault, with reports on the ground that an Israeli military attack near a mosque in the camp had killed at least three people.

Nabih Abu Rudeineh, a spokesperson for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, urged Israel's ally Washington to put an end to the "blind support that leads to the killing of thousands of innocent civilians, including children, women, and the elderly."

Egypt said Israel's "deliberate killing" of unarmed Palestinians shows that it lacks a political will to end the war in Gaza.

This condemnation came as mediators were pushing to resume ceasefire talks, and said that the killing of Gaza civilians showed Israel had no intention to end the war.

Escalation of tensions 'in no party's interest'

Egypt, the U.S. and Qatar have scheduled a new round of ceasefire negotiations for August 15, as fears are growing of a broader conflict, involving Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has said he will not end the war until Hamas no longer poses a threat to Israelis, said a delegation would be sent to these talks.

A Hamas official told reporters the group was studying the new offer for talks but did not elaborate.

Iran is set to carry out an order by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to "harshly punish" Israel over the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, a Revolutionary Guards deputy commander was quoted as saying by local news agencies.

Israel has not claimed or denied responsibility for the killing, which has fueled further concern that the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip was turning into a wider Middle East war.

In response to these remarks, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said the U.S. was ready to defend Israel with plenty of resources in the region, adding: "When we hear rhetoric like that we've got to take it seriously, and we do."

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