Gaza: Israeli attack on camp near school kills 25

At least 29 Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded in an Israeli air strike on a refugee camp outside a school in southern Gaza, hospital officials said.

The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said the air strike occurred near the gate of al-Awda school in the town of Abasan al-Kabira, east of Khan Younis, and put the initial death toll at 25.

A video showed more than a dozen dead and seriously injured people, including several children, lying on the floor of a local hospital.

The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports, which came a week after it ordered civilians to evacuate Abasan al-Kabira and other areas east of Khan Younis, displacing tens of thousands of people.

A source at Nasser hospital, where the injured were taken, said they expected the death toll to rise.

Al-Awda School is home to displaced people from villages east of Khan Younis.

The attack caused widespread destruction and the deaths of women and children. Body parts were strewn everywhere and many people in tents outside the school were also injured.

This was the fourth attack on or near a school where displaced people have taken shelter in the past four days.

The Israeli military said it carried out the first three air strikes because politicians, police and Hamas militants were using them as bases.

On Saturday, 16 people were killed in an attack on a UN-run school in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, where about 2,000 people have been displaced, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry.

An attack on a church-run school in Gaza City the following day killed a senior Hamas government official and three others, local sources said.

And on Monday night, several people were reportedly injured in an attack on another UN-run school in Nuseirat.