UPDATE - 16 killed as Israel targets school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza for 2nd time in 1 hour

UPDATES WITH FRESH ATTACK ON SAME SCHOOL SHELTERING PALESTINIANS, DEATH TOLL INCREASED, HAMAS RESPONSE, CHANGES HEADLINE, LEDE

By Mohammed Majed and Said Amori

GAZA CITY, Palestine (AA) – Israeli forces on Saturday evening carried out two more airstrikes on the same school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza City that was targeted an hour earlier, bringing the total death toll to 16, with scores of others injured.

The Palestinian Civil Defense said in a statement that the new bombing on Hamama School in Sheikh Radwan neighborhood killed six more displaced people and injured scores more, some of them being in “serious” condition.

According to the statement, Civil Defense teams are having difficulty retrieving more victims due to the renewed bombing.

Following the first airstrike, Israeli aircraft bombed the same school and its surroundings with three missiles.

In an earlier statement on Telegram, the Civil Defense stated, "Some 10 Palestinians were martyred and several others were injured by Israeli occupation (forces) warplanes that targeted a school sheltering displaced people in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in northern Gaza City."

Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital received “several martyrs and wounded, including children, as a result of an Israeli airstrike that targeted Hamama School,” sources in the health facility said.

Eyewitnesses told Anadolu that the bombing destroyed several classrooms at the school, which is overcrowded with displaced Palestinians.

The Israeli military admitted in a statement that it attacked the school in northern Gaza, claiming that Hamas was using it as a "weapons storage."

However, Hamas rejected the Israeli army's claim, describing it as "blatant lies," and questioned the justification for targeting the schools used by displaced Palestinians as shelter.

The Israeli attack on the Hamama School is "a continued insistence by the terrorist occupation government to persist in its brutal genocide campaign," the resistance movement said.

Israel, flouting a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire, has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza since an Oct. 7 attack by Hamas.

More than 39,500 Palestinians have since been killed, mostly women and children, and over 91,000 injured, according to local health authorities.

Almost 10 months into the Israeli war, vast tracts of Gaza lie in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water, and medicine.

Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which ordered it to immediately halt its military operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on May 6.

*Writing by Rania Abu Shamala