Israeli air strike hits Gaza school

Gaza’s civil defence agency said an Israeli strike hit a school in Gaza City yesterday, killing at least 12 people, while top US diplomat Antony Blinken was in Egypt for talks on a Gaza ceasefire.

The bodies of ten men and two children were pulled out of the building “after an Israeli plane dropped a bomb on the second floor of the (Mustafa Hafiz School) building housing thousands of displaced people,” agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.

He said 15 people were wounded in the strike. The Israeli military said the school was targeted because it housed a Hamas command and control centre. It said it carried out a “precise strike on terrorists who were operating” inside the school.

• Mustafa Hafiz School housed thousands of displaced people
• After US talks, Egypt’s Sisi warns of regional war
• Death toll in Gaza now 40,173

In recent weeks, the military has struck several schools across Gaza,  primarily in Gaza City, accusing them of housing Hamas command centres, which Hamas denies. Tens of thousands of displaced people have taken refuge in schools since the Israeli offensive in Gaza broke out on October 7.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said yesterday that at least 40,173 people have been killed in the Palestinian territory in more than 10 months of offensive. The toll includes 34 deaths in the past 24 hours, according to ministry figures.

Blinken flew to El Alamein, the Mediterranean city famous for a World War II battle, yesterday and held talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi at his summer palace. Sisi warned of the risk of the Gaza offensive expanding regionally in a way “difficult to imagine”.

“The ceasefire in Gaza must be the beginning of broader international recognition of the Palestinian state and the implementation of the two-state solution, as this is the basic guarantor of stability in the region,” he added.

Afterwards, Blinken was scheduled to head to a meeting with Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, in Doha, the scene of ceasefire talks last week.

On Monday evening, Blinken had “a very constructive meeting” with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Later, he said Israel had accepted a US “bridging proposal” for a deal and urged Hamas to do the same.

Both Egypt and Qatar are working alongside the United States to broker a truce. Washington put forward the latest proposal last week aimed at after the talks in Doha.

Ahead of those talks, Hamas called on the mediators to implement the framework set out by US President Joe Biden in late May, rather than hold more negotiations.

The movement said on Sunday that the current US proposal “responds to Netanyahu’s conditions”.