Bangkok Post – At least five dead in Israeli airstrike on Gaza mosque

The attack on the mosque near Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip came as Israel's war in the Palestinian enclave approached its first anniversary.

Eyewitnesses said the number of victims could rise as the mosque was being used to house displaced people.

The Israeli military said in a statement it “carried out a targeted attack on Hamas terrorists operating in a command and control center embedded in a building previously used as the 'Shuhada al-Aqsa' mosque in the area from Deir al Balah”.

The latest bloodshed in the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict was sparked when Palestinian Hamas militants attacked southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostage, according to Israel.

According to the Gaza Health Ministry, the subsequent Israeli military attack on Gaza killed nearly 42,000 Palestinians. It has also displaced nearly all of the enclave's 2.3 million people, caused a hunger crisis and led to genocide charges at the World Court, which Israel denies.