At least 15 killed in Israeli attack on UN-run school sheltering displaced Gazans

GAZA CITY, Palestine

At least 15 people were killed in Israeli bombardment of a UN-run school sheltering displaced Palestinians in the central Gaza Strip on Sunday, according to local authorities.

Some 80 other people were injured in the Israeli attack that targeted the Abu Oreiban School run by the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) in the Nuseirat refugee camp, Gaza's government media office said.

According to witnesses, several children and women were among the victims.

"This massacre was the latest in the genocide being committed by the (Israeli) occupation army against our Palestinian people," the media office said.

The Israeli army confirmed the attack, claiming that the school served as a hideout and operational infrastructure for attacks against its forces.

A military statement alleged that the army used "precise munitions and additional intelligence" to mitigate the risk of harming civilians.

Sunday's school attack came one day after at least 90 people were killed and nearly 300 others injured in an Israeli strike on a "humanitarian zone" for displaced Palestinians in the southern Gaza Strip.

Flouting a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire, Israel has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza since an Oct. 7 attack by Hamas.

Nearly 38,600 Palestinians have since been killed, mostly women and children, and nearly 88,900 injured, according to local health authorities.

Over nine months into the Israeli onslaught, vast tracts of Gaza lie in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water and medicine.

Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whose latest ruling ordered it to immediately halt its military operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on May 6.

* Writing by Ikram Kouachi and Rania Abu Shamala