Eight Palestinians were killed yesterday, sunday, at Israeli air strike at a vocational school near her hometown Gaza used to distribute aid, according to Palestinian eyewitnesses, as Israeli tanks advanced further into the city of Rafaat the southern end of the Gaza Strip.

The raid hit part of a vocational school of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which is now providing aid to displaced families, witnesses said.

“Some people were coming to get vouchers and others have been displaced from their homes and had taken shelter here. Some were getting water, others were getting coupons and suddenly we heard something fall. We ran away, those carrying water let it spill,” said Mohammed Tafes, one of the eyewitnesses.

A Reuters photographer saw a low-rise building completely demolished and bodies wrapped in blankets lying by the road, awaiting transport.

“We recovered witnesses (under the rubble), one who was selling soft drinks and another who was selling pastries and others who were distributing or taking coupons,” Tafes added. “There were around 4-5 witnesses and 10 injured. Fortunately, the condition of the injured is good,” he noted.

The Israeli military announced that the building, which it said had previously served as UNRWA’s headquarters facility, was now being used by Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters. He added that precautionary measures were taken before the raid to reduce the risk of harm to civilians.

“Today (Sunday) morning, IAF fighter jets guided by IDF and ISA intelligence struck a terrorist infrastructure operated by Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists,” the Israeli military said in a statement.

“This is another example of Hamas’ systematic exploitation of civilian infrastructure and the civilian population as a human shield for its terrorist activities,” he adds.

Hamas denies Israeli accusations that it uses civilians as human shields or civilian facilities for military purposes.

Juliette Touma, UNRWA’s director of communications, said the agency was reviewing details of the reported attack before providing more information.

“Since the war began, we have recorded that almost 190 of our buildings have been hit. This is the vast majority of our buildings in Gaza,” she said. A total of 193 UNRWA team members have been killed in the conflict, he added.

Just after midnight, an Israeli airstrike hit a clinic in Gaza City, killing the director of the ambulance and emergency service at the Palestinian enclave’s health ministry, Hani Al-Jaafarui, and another medical staff member, Hamas media reported. under whose administration the Gaza Strip is. At the moment Israel has not commented on this information.

The “intensive phase” ends

The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday that the phase of intense fighting against Hamas in the Gaza Strip would end “very quickly”, but noted that the war would not end until the Palestinian Islamist movement no longer controlled the Palestinian enclave.

“After the intensive phase is over, we will be able to move part of the forces to the north. And we will do that,” Netanyahu said in an interview with Israel’s Channel 14 network.

Israel’s fighting against the Iranian-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah has escalated on the northern border with Lebanon, where many Israeli towns have been evacuated. Netanyahu added that development in the north will allow residents to return to their homes.

In Israel’s more than eight-month war in the Hamas-run Palestinian enclave, its advance is focused on the two areas its forces have yet to capture – Rafah, on the southern edge of the Gaza Strip, and the areas around Deir al Balach in its central part.

Israel’s air and ground operation in Gaza was triggered by an attack by Hamas militants in its southern territory on October 7, which killed about 1,200 people and took more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli accounts.

The retaliatory Israeli attack has killed nearly 37,600 people, according to Palestinian health authorities, and reduced much of Gaza to rubble.

Residents said Israeli tanks advanced on the outskirts of the Mawazi displaced persons camp in northwestern Rafah amid heavy fighting with Hamas-led fighters as part of their push into the west and north of the city where they have, according to residents, , blew up dozens of houses in recent days.

“The battles with the resistance were intense. The occupation forces are now monitoring the Mawazi area from above, which has forced families there to head for Khan Younis,” a resident, who asked not to be named, said on a messaging app.

The Israeli military said it was continuing “targeted, intelligence-led operations” in the Rafah area and had identified weapons caches and tunnels and killed Palestinian militants.

The armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad announced that their fighters attacked Israeli forces in Rafah with anti-tank rockets, mortar shells and IEDs.

In Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, health officials at Kamal Antoine Hospital said two babies died of malnutrition. That brings to at least 31 the number of children who have died of malnutrition or dehydration since Oct. 7, which health officials say is likely lower than the actual number.