An Israeli airstrike on a UN building in Jabalia refugee camp on Wednesday killed at least 19 people, including nine children, according to the civil defence agency in Gaza.
The Israeli military said it was targeting Hamas militants inside a command and control centre.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, April 2, 2025, the Israeli army confirmed the strike and told AFP that the building housed a UN-run clinic. It claimed the facility was being used by Hamas’s Jabalia Battalion to coordinate attacks.
However, civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said the strike hit a UNRWA building that had been sheltering displaced families and operating as a medical clinic. He also reported dozens of injuries.
The UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) said in a statement on Wednesday that the strike hit two rooms on the first floor of a destroyed health centre where 160 displaced families had taken shelter.
“Many displaced families have not left the site, simply because they have nowhere else to go,” UNRWA stated, adding that its staff were present when the attack occurred at 10 am. The agency also stressed that it had previously shared the building’s coordinates with the Israeli military.
The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned what it called a “massacre at the UNRWA clinic in Jabalia,” urging international intervention to halt Israel’s offensive. The Islamic Jihad group also denounced the bombing as a blatant war crime.
Israel has previously targeted UNRWA buildings sheltering displaced civilians in Gaza, where Israeli bombardment has continued for nearly 18 months.
A September 11 airstrike on the Al-Jawni school, a UN-run facility, sparked international condemnation after UNRWA confirmed that six staff members were among the 18 people killed.
Israel maintains that Hamas uses civilian sites as cover, an allegation the Palestinian group has denied. The latest strike comes as Israel resumed large-scale air raids on Gaza on March 18, following its violation of the truce agreements.
On Wednesday, Israeli airstrikes also hit southern and central Gaza, with the civil defence agency reporting at least 15 more casualties, including children, in Khan Yunis and Nuseirat refugee camp.
Since March 18, at least 1,042 people have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, according to the health ministry, which the United Nations deems reliable.
Since the war began in October 2023, the ministry reports that 50,399 people have been killed.
