At least 17 people were killed in an Israeli attack on a school housing displaced Palestinians in central Gaza, as Israeli forces carried out attacks across the enclave.
Palestinian medical officials said the Israeli attack on the Nuseirat refugee camp killed mostly women and children, including an 11-month-old baby, and wounded 42 others.
Al-Awda Hospital, which received the victims, said the dead included 13 children under the age of 18 and three women.
The Israeli military claimed it had attacked Hamas fighters inside the school, without providing evidence. Israel has carried out several attacks on schools housing displaced Palestinian families in recent months, often killing women and children.
Medical sources told Al Jazeera that at least 34 people were killed in Israeli strikes on the besieged enclave on Thursday, as Israel shelled central and southern Gaza and its troops continued a ground offensive and siege in the northern part of the Gaza Strip. .
Some 400,000 people remain trapped in the widely devastated area, mainly in Jabalia, Beit Hanoon and Beit Lahiya.
The Gaza Government Media Office said at least 770 Palestinians have been killed and another 1,000 wounded in the attack, which marked its 20th day on Thursday.
United Nations humanitarian officials have reported “distressing levels of death, injury and destruction” in northern Gaza.
Meanwhile, health workers warned of a catastrophic situation there, as scarce supplies are dwindling rapidly amid the continuing siege.
Hussam Abu Safia, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, said Israeli army tanks surrounded the facility and the hospital was “directly attacked” on Thursday.
He told Al Jazeera that Arab tank shelling of the hospital caused severe damage to its intensive care unit. Israeli soldiers also opened fire toward the windows of the facility, Abu Safia said, as well as toward the main entrance to the hospital, causing widespread “fear and panic” among the children and patients inside.
The day before, he said more than 150 injured people were inside the hospital, including 14 children in intensive care or the neonatal department.
“There are a large number of injuries and we lose at least one person every hour due to lack of supplies and medical staff,” Abu Safia said in a video message on Wednesday.
“Our ambulances cannot transport the injured,” he said. “Those who can get to the hospital alone receive care, but those who cannot simply die in the streets.”
Images shared with The Related Press news agency show medical staff caring for premature babies and several older children in hospital beds, some with severe burns. A girl is seen strapped to a respirator, with bandages on her face and flies hovering over her.
“We are providing the bare minimum to patients. “Everyone is paying the price for what is happening now in northern Gaza,” said Abu Safia.
Kamal Adwan is one of three hospitals in the north that were left largely inaccessible due to the Israeli attacks. The war has destroyed the health system throughout Gaza, and only 16 of 39 hospitals are partially functioning, according to the World Health Organization.
Gaza's civil defense said they had suspended operations in the north, accusing Israeli forces of threatening to kill their crews.
Israeli forces fired on one of their teams in the town of Beit Lahiya after ordering them to move to the Indonesian Hospital, where troops are stationed.
Three civil defense members were injured in the attack and a fire truck was destroyed, the civil defense said in a statement. He said five other members of his staff were detained by Israeli forces at the hospital.
“As a result, we declare that Civil Defense operations in the northern Gaza Strip have been completely suspended, leaving these areas without any firefighting, rescue or emergency medical services,” he said.
The siege continues
Al Jazeera's Hind Khoudary, reporting from Deir el-Balah, in central Gaza, said the situation for civilians in the north was “depressing.”
“There is no food, no water, no civil defense teams, no ambulances, no paramedics,” Khoudary said.
Israeli forces are “forcing people to leave their homes, to abandon their shelters and also separating families from each other,” he said. “They are putting numbers on men. “They are putting numbers on people and questioning them.”
Israel's deadly attack on Gaza that began in October last year destroyed much of the besieged enclave's infrastructure and internally displaced about 90 percent of Gaza's population of 2.3 million, often multiple times.
Hundreds of thousands of people are crammed into tent camps along the coast after entire neighborhoods in many areas were reduced to rubble.
According to Palestinian health authorities, more than 42,000 people have died, while thousands more are missing or trapped under rubble.
The United States and Qatar announced Thursday that negotiations on a ceasefire in Gaza would resume.
Months of ceasefire negotiations brokered by Qatar, the United States and Egypt stalled mid-year.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Qatari officials in Doha on Thursday and said ceasefire talks would resume “in the coming days.”
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