DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,
Al-Mawasi, where thousands of displaced Palestinians are sheltering, has been targeted numerous times since October.
More than 50 Palestinians have been killed and many are wounded in Israeli military strikes on al-Mawasi, located west of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, medical sources told Al Jazeera.
The attack on Saturday by Israeli warplanes targeted tents housing displaced Palestinians and a water distillation unit in an area that a Gaza civil defence spokesperson told Al Jazeera was designated a “safe zone” by the Israeli military.
Images from the scene showed Palestinians trying to rescue people from under the rubble, with children and paramedics among the wounded.
Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum said this was “a new massacre committed by the Israeli military”, adding that the area was hit by “five bombs and five missiles”.
“The scenes that are coming from the area that was targeted are incredibly bloody and devastating,” he said, adding that the victims were taken to the Nasser and Kuwaiti hospitals.
Gaza’s Ministry of Health said it can confirm at least 20 killed and 90 wounded Palestinians were brought to the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, with some critically wounded.
An official at Nasser Hospital told Al Jazeera that more than 20 bodies were brought to the hospital, as well as dozens of wounded people.
But he emphasised that medical teams did not have the capacity to receive any more wounded patients, who civil defence teams continue to recover from the site of the bombing.
The Gaza Government Media Office also issued a statement saying more than 100 people, including civil defence staff, were killed or wounded in the attack.
