War on Gaza: Agency reports that UNRWA staff killed in Israeli attack on school

At least 18 people, including six aid agency employees, were killed in an Israeli attack on a school run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday.

According to the UN, around 12,000 displaced Palestinians, most of them women and children, sought shelter in the Al-Jawni school in Nuseirat in central Gaza.

According to UNRWA, the attack caused “the highest death toll among our staff in a single incident.”

“Among those killed were the head of the Unrwa shelter and other team members who were providing assistance to the displaced,” the agency said on X.

In an earlier statement, the Israeli army said it had attacked Hamas members in a “command and control center” at the school, but no evidence was provided.

According to UNRWA, this is the fifth attack on the school since the start of the Israeli Gaza war in October last year.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the attack and said: “These dramatic violations of international humanitarian law must stop now.”

He also described the situation in the Gaza Strip as “completely unacceptable”.

Since the war began, at least 220 UNRWA workers have been killed in the Gaza Strip.

Simply tragic.#Gaza
Six @UNRWA Colleagues were killed today when two airstrikes hit a school and its surroundings in Nuseirat, central Syria.
This is the highest number of fatalities among our employees in a single incident.
Among those killed were the head of the UNRWA emergency shelter and others …

— UNRWA (@UNRWA) 11 September 2024

Israel had previously accused UNRWA of having links to Hamas, a claim the agency has repeatedly denied.

“Humanitarian personnel, facilities and operations have been blatantly and unabatedly disregarded since the beginning of the war,” UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said at X.

“The longer impunity prevails, the more international humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions become irrelevant.”

More than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the war began on October 7, 2023, when a Hamas-led attack on Israel killed more than 1,100 Israelis and captured hundreds.