The raid on Thursday came after the military announced a new ground and air assault in several refugee camps in central Gaza.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa said thousands of displaced Palestinians were sheltering at al-Sardi school, which is linked to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), when it came under attack.
Palestinian group Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip, condemned the predawn attack as a “horrible massacre”.
Moreover, an Al Jazeera correspondent reports that Israeli raids and artillery shelling have targeted areas west of the city of Rafah in southern Gaza.
An investigation by Al Jazeera’s Sanad news verification agency reveals that the Israeli army targeted an UNRWA school sheltering displaced people in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza with missiles equipped with US-made guidance systems.
At least three missiles fired from fighter jets were used in the attack on Wednesday night that killed 40 displaced people, including 14 children and nine women. Seventy-four people were injured, Gaza’s Government Media Office said.
Images of missile fragments analysed by Sanad’s field team identified components from Honeywell, an American company specialising in precision guidance systems. Similar components were used in a 2014 Israeli attack on a Palestinian home in Gaza City’s Shujayea neighbourhood.
The global health agency says the attacks have resulted in 727 fatalities and 933 injuries and affected 101 health facilities and 113 ambulances since the start of the war.
“Two-fifths (37%) of attacks were in Gaza City, nearly a quarter (23%) in north Gaza, and over a quarter (28%) in Khan Younis,” the WHO added on X.
In a speech during a demonstration against the government in the Israeli city of Modi’in, philosopher, author and researcher Asa Kosher has criticised Netanyahu’s policies, calling them a “major disaster” that leads to the “absurd” death of Israeli soldiers.
Israel’s Channel 14 published a video of Kosher’s speech in which he calls for elections to “cleanse” the “moral filth” in the government.
“The great catastrophe in a soldier’s life is death, and this stupid slogan that it is good to die for our country, has never had moral value, real roots,” he said.
He said Israeli military operations are extended as much as possible to prolong the life of the “ruling fraudulent regime”, in which case the goals and tasks are unfair, noting that soldiers are “killed in vain” to serve the personal ambitions of the prime minister.
“When they die in vain it is the great disaster that can befall them because they are not only killed, they are killed in vain, and it is difficult to say that, but we have to say it,” he said.
