Israeli air strikes targeted Jabalia, Gaza’s largest refugee camp, for the second time in two days on Wednesday. As rescue workers clawed through the rubble and footage showed smoke billowing above the camp, there was no immediate confirmation on the number of casualties.
In Tuesday’s attack, the Hamas-run health ministry said that more than 50 people were killed. Israel claimed to have killed a Hamas commander in that strike.
The densely populated camp in the north of the besieged enclave covers an area of 1.4 square kilometres (0.5 sq miles). According to the United Nations, there are some 116,000 registered refugees in the camp.
Yesterday:
There’s been more confirmation of the Israeli airstrikes on a densely populated refugee camp in Jabaliya neighborhood, which lies north of Gaza City. Israel’s military has owned up to it, saying an important senior Hamas commander who helped plan the Oct.7 terror attack was eliminated. Al Jazeera is citing health sources at the nearby “Indonesian Hospital” to say that at least 50 Palestinians have been killed, mostly civilians, and that number is expected to rise. “Hundreds” are said to have been injured and killed in the attack, per Sky News.
But when an IDF spokesman was pressed by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer over why Israel chose to attack even while knowing hundreds of civilians were there, he essentially explained that eliminating the Hamas commander was more important than safeguarding civilian lives (see exchange below). The New York Times has detailed of the massive strikes on the neighborhood area and refugee camp: