United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said late Wednesday that Israeli air strikes on a school-turned-shelter in Gaza killed six staffers from the UN Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA).
“What’s happening in Gaza is totally unacceptable,” Guterres said in a post on social media platform X. “Six of our @UNRWA colleagues are among those killed.”
UNRWA called it the highest death toll among its staff in a single incident.
“This school has been hit five times since the war began. It is home to around 12,000 displaced people, mainly women and children,” UNRWA separately posted on X.
Earlier on Wednesday, the Israeli army and Gaza’s civil defence agency said a strike hit Al-Jawni school in Nuseirat.
Rescuers said the strike killed 18 people, including UN staffers.
The Israeli military said its air force had “conducted a precise strike on terrorists who were operating inside a Hamas command-and-control centre” on the school grounds, without elaborating on its outcome or the identities of those targeted.
“Among those killed was the manager of the UNRWA shelter and other team members providing assistance to displaced people,” the UN agency posted on X.
“Schools and other civilian infrastructure must be protected at all times, they are not a target.”
Across the besieged strip, many school buildings have been repurposed to shelter displaced families as the vast majority of Gaza’s 2.4 million people have been repeatedly uprooted by the war.
Israeli forces have struck several such schools in recent months, saying Palestinian militants were operating there and hiding among displaced civilians — charges denied by Hamas.
