23 killed in Israel strike on Gaza residential block

Gaza’s civil defence agency said an Israeli strike on a residential building in Gaza City killed at least 23 people on Wednesday, most of them children or women, as the military said it targeted a “senior Hamas” member.

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The latest strike comes weeks into a renewed offensive by Israeli military on the war-battered territory, which has displaced hundreds of thousands, while an aid blockade has revived the spectre of famine for its 2.4 million people.

The strike took place in the Shujaiya neighbourhood of Gaza City, the agency’s spokesman Mahmoud Bassal told reporters.

“The death toll from the Shujaiya massacre has risen to 23 martyrs, including eight children and 10 women,” he said, adding that more than 60 people were wounded.

“There are still people trapped under the rubble.”

Ayub Salim, a 26-year-old Shujaiya resident, told AFP he witnessed the strike on the four-storey block.

He said the area was hit with “multiple missiles” and was “overcrowded with tents, displaced people and homes”.

“Shrapnel flew in all directions,” he said, speaking of “terrifying and indescribable scene”.

“Dust and massive destruction filled the entire place, we couldn’t see anything, just the screams and panic of the people.”

Salim said the dead were “torn to pieces”.