Over 30 killed in Israeli bombing on Al-Maghazi camp in Gaza: health ministry

More than 30 people were killed in an Israeli bombing on a refugee camp in central Gaza late Saturday, the  Palestinian health ministry said, amid ongoing fighting between Israel and Hamas.

“More than 30 (dead) arrived at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir Al-Balah in the massacre committed by the occupation in Al-Maghazi camp in the central Gaza Strip,” health ministry spokesperson Ashraf Al-Qudra said in a statement.

Hamas said in a statement posted on Telegram that Israel had “directly” bombed citizens’ homes, adding that most of the dead were women and children.

“An Israeli air strike targeted my neighbours’ house in Al-Maghazi camp, my house next door partially collapsed,” said Mohammed Alaloul, 37, a journalist working for the Turkish Anadolu Agency.

Alaloul told AFP his 13-year-old son, Ahmed, and his 4-year-old son, Qais, were killed in the attack, along with his brother. His wife, mother, and two other children were injured.

An Israeli military spokesperson said they were looking into whether the Israel Defense Forces had been operating in the area at the time of the bombing.

The health ministry in Gaza says more than 9,480 Gazans, mostly women and children, have been killed in Israeli strikes and the intensifying ground campaign.

Israeli chief of staff Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi visited troops inside Gaza on Saturday after they completed an encirclement of Gaza City, which lies to the north of Al-Maghazi.

Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters have gathered in London to call for a ceasefire in Gaza amid ongoing bombardments by Israel after October 7, AFP reports.

At the rally, held in Trafalgar Square in central London, protesters waved Palestinian flags and held placards calling for an immediate ceasefire.

Sama Dababneh, 26, a Jordanian business consultant who came to the rally with her Palestinian friends, said they were tired of the stream of upsetting images coming from Gaza.