Airstrike on Gaza school kills dozens; IDF says it was targeting a Hamas cell

June 6 (UPI) -- An Israeli airstrike on a U.N. school sheltering displaced Palestinians in central Gaza on Thursday killed at least 27 people, Gaza officials said.

An Israel Defense Forces warplane reportedly fired two missiles at classrooms on the top level of the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency school in the Nuseirat refugee camp.

The IDF confirmed the attack but insisted it was a "precision strike" targeting a Hamas cell involved in the Oct. 7 attacks on southern Israel, that it had taken "a number of steps" to mitigate the risk to civilians -- including postponing the strike twice and "conducting aerial surveillance and additional intelligence information" -- adding that the three classrooms struck were away from where civilians were sheltering.

"Eliminated: several Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists who embedded themselves inside of a UNWRA school", it said in a post on X.

"Israeli Air Force fighter jets conducted a precise strike on a Hamas compound embedded inside the school in the area of Nuseirat. These terrorists belonged to the Nukhba Forces and participated in the Oct. 7 massacre."

The post was accompanied by an aerial reconnaissance photo outlining the specific locations where the IDF said the militants were based in the multi-story building. The plan image of the building clearly shows "U.N." painted in large black lettering on the roof.

The IDF said as many as 30 Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters were present.

Israel has long alleged that Hamas embeds itself in schools, hospitals and other civilian infrastructure where civilians have taken shelter from the fighting, using them as bases for terror activity.

Hamas condemned the strike as a "horrific massacre."

The Hamas-affiliated Quds News Network published footage online that it said showed bodies being removed "in the massacre committed by the occupation after the bombing of the Al-Sardi School, which houses displaced persons, in the Nuseirat camp."

Khalil al-Degran, a spokesman for the al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in nearby Deir-al-Balah, told The Washington Post that the casualties from the attack included children.

Gaza's Hamas-run Health Ministry said 36 Palestinians had been killed and 115 injured 24-hour period to noon Wednesday bringing the total number killed in the 243-day-old conflict to 36,586 and 83,074 injured.