AT LEAST 40 people have been killed and more than 60 others injured in Gaza after multiple Israeli air strikes hit a designated humanitarian zone, Palestinian officials have said.
Residents and medics at a tent encampment near Khan Younis, in the Al-Mawasi area, reportedly said the area was struck by at least four missiles in the early hours of Tuesday as dozens of tents caught fire.
The missile attack reportedly left craters as deep as nine meters in the designated humanitarian safety zone which was established by Israel in October last year.
A number of other attacks have been reported in the area since the conflict began including “shelling” of the tents in July which killed 25 people.
A Gaza civil emergency official told the Guardian that their teams “are still moving out martyrs and wounded from the targeted area” and added, “it looks like a new Israeli massacre”.
Palestinian officials have said women and children are amongst those who were killed and injured in the attacks but did not specify numbers.
Pictures shared online show rescue workers using shovels to sift through the sand, while bystanders used their hands to help dig for survivors.
In a statement, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said it had carried out an attack, which they claim “struck significant Hamas terrorists who were operating within a command and control centre embedded inside the humanitarian area in Khan Younis”.
Hamas has denied Israel's claims that it had gunmen in the camp and that it exploited civilian areas for military purposes.
They claimed that Israel’s statement was “a clear lie that aims to justify these ugly crimes”.
In a statement, Hamas called the strike a “brutal act of genocide” and claimed Israel's attacks “are being deliberately carried out without regard for international law, humanitarian law, or resolutions calling for an end to the aggression”.
Civil defence official Mohammed Al-Mughair told the AFP news agency that “40 martyrs and 60 injured were recovered and transferred” to nearby hospitals after the strike.
“Our crews are still working to recover 15 missing people as a result of targeting the tents of the displaced in Mawasi, Khan Younis,” Mughair said.
It has been widely reported that civil defence sources said that the strike had left behind large craters.
“Entire families disappeared in the Mawasi Khan Younis massacre, under the sand, in deep holes,” said civil defence spokesperson Mahmoud Basal.
According to the UN 86% of the Gaza population has been put under evacuation orders by the Israeli military and often people have been displaced multiple times.
Humanitarian officials confirmed last month the camp near Khan Younis was overcrowded and that there is nowhere else for people to go.
“There’s just no space and people know that, so they stay where they are. You can’t get hold of tents, so even if you found somewhere, it would be difficult to get any shelter, and conditions there are terrible,” a UN official based in Gaza told the Guardian.
“Some people refuse to move [to al-Mawasi] because they just don’t want to leave their homes but most because they’ll have nowhere to live if they go there.”
