Strike kills 40 in humanitarian zone

GAZA/JERUSALEM — An Israeli strike on a crowded tent camp housing Palestinians displaced by the fighting in Gaza killed at least 40 people and wounded 60 others early on Tuesday, Palestinian officials said. Israel said it targeted "significant" Hamas militants and disputed the death toll.

It was among the deadliest strikes yet in Muwasi, a sprawl of crowded tent camps along the Gaza coast that Israel designated as a humanitarian zone for hundreds of thousands of civilians to seek shelter from the Gaza conflict.

Gaza's civil defense agency said its first responders recovered 40 bodies from the strike and were still looking for people. It said entire families were killed in their tents.

An Associated Press camera operator saw three large craters at the scene, where first responders and displaced people were sifting through the sand and rubble with garden tools and their bare hands by the light of mobile phones. They pulled body parts from the sand, including what appeared to be a human leg.

Attaf al-Shaar, who was displaced from the southern city of Rafah, said the strike happened just after midnight and caused a fire.

"The people were buried in the sand. They were retrieved as body parts," she told an Associated Press reporter at the scene.

Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, one of three hospitals to receive casualties, said about two dozen bodies were brought in from the targeted strike.

The Israeli military said it had struck Hamas militants who were operating from a command-and-control center. It said its forces used precise munitions, aerial surveillance and other means to avoid civilian casualties.

Daniel Hagari, an Israeli military spokesman, disputed the reported number of casualties in a post on social media platform X, saying the reports "do not line up with the information available to the (Israeli army), the precise weapons used and the accuracy of the strike".

He said the militants killed were directly involved in the Oct 7 attack and accused them of committing other recent attacks against Israel and Israeli forces, without elaborating.

Hamas released a statement denying any militants were in the area. Neither Israel nor Hamas provided evidence to substantiate their claims.

Israel says it tries to avoid harming civilians throughout the conflict and blames Hamas for their deaths because the militants often operate in residential areas and are known to position tunnels, rocket launchers and other infrastructure near homes, schools and mosques.

Talks in deadlock

The United States, Egypt and Qatar have spent much of this year trying to broker an agreement for a cease-fire and the release of the hostages, but the talks have got repeatedly bogged down as Israel and Hamas have accused each other of making new and unacceptable demands.

The conflict has plunged Gaza into a humanitarian crisis, and humanitarian groups have struggled to provide aid because of ongoing fighting, Israeli restrictions, and the breakdown of law and order. The international authority on the severity of hunger crises said in June that the territory is at high risk of famine.

The main United Nations agency providing aid to Palestinians said Israeli troops stopped a convoy taking part in a polio vaccination campaign for more than eight hours on Monday, despite it coordinating with the military. Philippe Lazzarini, head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, said the staff members who were held had been taking part in the campaign in northern Gaza and Gaza City.

He said the staff and the convoy later returned to a UN base, but it was unclear if a polio vaccination campaign would take place on Tuesday in northern Gaza. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The UN chief said on Monday that the United Nations has offered to monitor any cease-fire in Gaza and demanded an end to the worst death and destruction he has seen in his more than seven-year tenure.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in an interview with The Associated Press that it's "unrealistic" to think the UN could play a role in Gaza's future, either by administering the territory or providing a peacekeeping force, because Israel is unlikely to accept a UN role.

Agencies Via Xinhua