Gaza, Aug 4: Israeli strikes early Sunday killed 12 people in Gaza, including four who were sheltering in a tent camp for displaced people inside a hospital complex, while a stabbing attack carried out by a Palestinian killed two people in a Tel Aviv suburb.Tensions have soared following nearly 10 months of war in Gaza and the killing of two senior militants in separate strikes in Lebanon and Iran last week. Those killings brought threats of revenge from Iran and its allies and raised fears of an even more destructive regional war.
A woman in her 70s and an 80-year-old man were killed in the stabbing attack, according to Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service and a nearby hospital, and two other men were wounded. The police said the attack was carried out by a Palestinian militant, who was “neutralised,” and that a search was underway for other suspects.
The rescuers said the wounded were found in three different locations, each about 500 metres apart, adding to concerns that more than one assailant was involved.
Israel has been bracing for retaliation after the killing of a senior Hezbollah commander in a strike in Lebanon and Hamas’ top political leader in an attack in Iran’s capital last week. Both were linked to the ongoing war in Gaza, which was triggered by Hamas’ October 7 attack into Israel.
In Gaza, an Israeli strike earlier on Sunday hit a tent camp housing displaced people in the courtyard of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, killing four people, including one woman, and injuring others, Gaza’s Health Ministry said.
An Associated Press journalist filmed men rushing to the scene to help the wounded and retrieve bodies, while trying to extinguish the fire.
The hospital in Deir al-Balah is the main medical facility operating in central Gaza, and thousands of people have taken shelter there after fleeing their homes in the war-ravaged territory.
A separate strike flattened a house in northern Gaza, killing at least eight people, including three children, their parents and their grandmother, according to the ministry.
An Israeli strike on a school-turned-shelter in Gaza City on Saturday killed at least 16 people and wounded another 21, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which announced the toll on Sunday. Israel’s military, which regularly accuses Palestinian militants of sheltering in civilian areas, said it struck a Hamas command centre.
Israel says it tries to avoid harming civilians, but the military rarely comments on individual strikes, which often kill women and children. Gaza’s Health Ministry does not differentiate between civilians and militants in its tallies.