Tensions between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah have reached new heights in the wake of a deadly rocket attack in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

The strike on Saturday hit a soccer field in the Arab town of Majdal Shams, home to a large Druze community, and killed at least 12 children, according to Israel.

Israel blamed Hezbollah for the attack and vowed to retaliate. The Iran-backed group denied being behind the strike.

Here’s what to know about the Golan Heights, and the religious and ethnic Druze minority that fell victim to the attack.

What is the Golan Heights?

The Golan Heights is a strategic plateau that Israeli seized from Syria during the Six-Day War in 1967, before formally annexing it in 1981. The hilly landscape, which spans some 500 square miles, also shares a border with Jordan and Lebanon.

Syria’s capital Damascus is visible from atop the rocky Golan. The Israeli-occupied part of the region is separated from Syria by a buffer zone supported by the United Nations.

The Golan Heights is considered to be occupied territory under international law and UN Security Council resolutions, and Syria continues to demand it be returned.

The area has often been a flashpoint, most recently in 2019 when former President Donald Trump said the US will recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights – a move that overturned years of policy and worsened tensions with Syria.

Israel sees the Golan Heights as key to its national security interests and says it needs to control the region to fend off threats from Syria and Iranian proxy groups there.

Saturday’s strike is not the first in the Golan Heights since Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza began following the October 7 attacks.

In early July, a Hezbollah rocket attack killed two people in the region, prompting Israel’s head of the Golan Regional Council to call for retaliation “with force” against the Lebanese group. Hezbollah had said earlier that it fired dozens of Katyusha rockets on the Golan Heights “in response” to an alleged Israeli attack in Syria targeting a Hezbollah key member.

Who are the Druze?

The Druze are an Arab sect of roughly one million people who primarily live in Syria, Lebanon and Israel.  Originating in Egypt in the 11th century, the group practices an offshoot of Islam which permits no converts – either to or from the religion – and no intermarriage.

More than 20,000 Druze live in the Golan Heights. Most of them identify as Syrian and rejected an offer of Israeli citizenship when Israel seized the region in 1967. Those who refused were given Israeli residency cards but are not considered Israeli citizens.

Druze of the Golan Heights share the territory with around 25,000 Jewish Israelis, spread across more than 30 settlements. Last year, the UN Human Rights Council sounded alarms over Israel’s plan to double the settler population on the Golan by 2027.

Syrian Druze in the Golan have suffered from discriminatory policies, especially those relating to land and water allocation, according to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

“Over the years, the expanding Israeli settlements and their activities had reduced the access of Syrian farmers to water, due to discriminatory policies related to prices and fees,” the UN committee said.

Druze in the Golan Heights have historically opposed Israeli laws they saw as attempts at “Israelization.” In 2018, thousands of Druze-led protesters opposed the Jewish Nation-State Basic Law put forth by the Israeli parliament, fearing it would deepen discrimination.

The law established Israel as the historic home of the Jewish people with a “united” Jerusalem as its capital and declared that the Jewish people “have an exclusive right to national self-determination” in Israel.

Druze leaders at the time said the controversial law made them feel like second-class citizens because it didn’t mention equality or minority rights.

Recent data reported in Israeli media shows an increase in the numbers of Druze from the Golan seeking Israeli citizenship, but the numbers doing so remain extremely small: 75 in 2017 to 239 in 2021

Outside the Golan, some 130,000 Israeli Druze live in the Carmel and Galilee in Israel’s north.

In contrast to other minority communities within Israel’s borders, many are fiercely patriotic. Druze men over 18 have been conscripted to the IDF since 1957 and often rise to positions of high rank, while many build careers in the police and security forces.

Back in May, Amos Hochstein, US President Joe Biden’s point-man for keeping a lid on tensions between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, spoke in a webinar.

“What I worry about every single day,” he said, “is that a miscalculation or an accident… hits a bus full of children, or hits another kind of civilian target, that could force the political system in either country to retaliate in a way that slides us into war. Even though both sides probably understand that a fuller or deeper-scale war is in neither side’s interest.”

The equivalent of that bus came on Saturday evening in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

A rocket, which Israel says was launched by Hezbollah from Chebaa in southern Lebanon, slammed into a soccer pitch in the Druze town of Majdal Shams. Twelve children, ranging in age from 10 to 16, were killed while taking part in a training session. Hezbollah has denied responsibility for the strike. Will Hochstein’s fear of a fuller-scale war now also come to pass?

If Israel’s Foreign Minister, Israel Katz, is to be believed, it probably will. “We are approaching the moment of an all-out war against Hezbollah,” he said in an Israeli television interview on Saturday evening. “The response to this event will be accordingly.”

The United States has apparently blessed retaliatory action, to some degree. “We stand by Israel’s right to defend its citizens from terrorist attacks,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken, before adding that the US did not want to “see the conflict escalate.”

For months now, the international community has been trying to de-escalate tensions between Israel and Hezbollah. With Iran’s strongest proxy estimated to have at least 150,000 missiles and rockets pointing south, the fear is of a war that would devastate Lebanon, and do serious damage to Israel.

And yet, over the past near-10 months of fighting, Israel, Hezbollah and Iran have always pulled back from what appeared to be the brink. In January, Israel took out a senior Hamas leader in Beirut. All-out war failed to materialise. In April, Israel killed a top commander in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRCHG) in Damascus. In response, Iran launched unprecedented strikes on Israel. All-out war failed to materialise.

The status quo, of course, can’t continue either. Tens of thousands of Israelis have been displaced from their homes. Large swathes of northern Israel are like ghost towns. A similar picture plays out in southern Lebanon. The best way to avoid all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah, says Blinken, is to get a ceasefire in Gaza. Talks aimed at achieving that resume on Sunday.

But that would only be a short-term fix. Israel wants to remove the Hezbollah threat entirely, moving it back to the Litani River, in accordance with the UN Security Council Resolution that ended the last major war between the two in 2006. “If the world doesn’t get Hezbollah away from the border, Israel will do it,” said Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in December.

And so despite the bombast, domestic pressures, the fears and the escalations, the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah continues to simmer rather than boil over. No one seems to want this war. But as Hochstein warned in that same webinar: “Wars have started historically around the world even when leaders didn’t want them, because they had no choice.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday Russia’s leadership was “hyper rational” and that Ukraine would never be able to fulfil its hopes of becoming a member of the European Union or NATO.

Orban, a nationalist in power since 2010, made the comments during a speech in which he forecast a shift in global power away from the “irrational” West towards Asia and Russia.

“In the next long decades, maybe centuries, Asia will be the dominant centre of the world,” Orban said, mentioning China, India, Pakistan and Indonesia as the world’s future big powers.

“And we Westerners pushed the Russians into this bloc as well,” he said in the televised speech before ethnic Hungarians at a festival in the town of Baile Tusnad in neighbouring Romania.

Orban, whose country currently holds the rotating EU presidency, has sharply differed from the rest of the bloc by seeking warmer ties with Beijing and Moscow, and he angered some EU leaders when he went on surprise visits to Kyiv, Moscow and Beijing this month for talks on the war in Ukraine.

He said that in contrast to the “weakness” of the West, Russia’s position in world affairs was rational and predictable, saying the country had shown economic flexibility in adapting to Western sanctions since it invaded Crimea in 2014.

Orban, whose own government has passed a number of anti-LGBT measures, said Russia had gained clout in many parts of the world by cracking down on LGBTQ+ rights.

“The strongest international appeal of Russian soft power is its opposition to LGBTQ,” he said.

He added that Ukraine would never become a member of the EU or NATO because “we Europeans do not have enough money for that”.

“The EU needs to give up its identity as a political project and become an economic and defence project,” Orban added.

The EU opened membership talks with Ukraine late last month, although a long and tough road lies ahead of the country before it can join the bloc.

A declaration at the end of the NATO summit this month said the alliance will support Ukraine on “its irreversible path” towards membership.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that the United States’ and Germany’s decision to deploy US long-range missiles in Germany from 2026 is “reminiscent of the events of the Cold War” and could see Russia station similar missiles in response.

“If the United States of America implements such plans, we will consider ourselves free from the unilateral moratorium on the deployment of medium and shorter-range strike weapons, including increasing the capabilities of the coastal forces of our Navy,” said Putin, speaking at Russia’s annual Navy Day in St. Petersburg.

Putin said that the US and Germany’s decision to begin “episodic deployments” of the long-range missile capabilities from its Multi-Domain Task Force in Germany starting in 2026 would put Russian infrastructure within the reach of the to-be-deployed missiles.

“This situation is reminiscent of the events of the Cold War related to the deployment of Pershing medium-range missiles in Europe,” he said.

Pershing II missiles, designed to deliver nuclear warheads, were deployed by the US Army at American bases in West Germany from 1983 to the alarm of the then Soviet leadership.

They were withdrawn with the introduction of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in 1988.

Putin added that the development of Russian medium and shorter-range strike weapons was “in the final stages,” and Russia would take “reciprocal measures to deploy them.”

The US and Germany in July issued a joint statement on the deployment of weapons systems in Germany, saying that “when fully developed, these conventional long-range fire units will include SM-6, Tomahawk, and developmental hypersonic weapons, which have significantly longer range than current land-based fires in Europe.”

Russia has repeatedly threatened to end its self-declared moratorium on fielding both “short range” and “intermediate range” land-based ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and missile launchers that could be used to carry either nuclear or conventional payloads.

Announcing the moratorium after the US withdrew from the INF in 2019, Russian deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said “Russia will refrain from deploying these systems when we acquire them unless the American equipment is deployed in certain regions.”

The treaty, which the US and Europe accused Moscow frequently violating, banned such missiles and was seen as a centerpiece of European security since the Cold War.

Russia soon followed the US in withdrawing from the treaty, sparking concerns of a new arms race.

Venezuelans headed to the polls on Sunday to vote in a highly consequential presidential election where the country’s longtime strongman, Nicolas Maduro, will face one of his greatest political challenges yet, say analysts.

Maduro, who took the mantle of the ruling Chavismo movement after his predecessor Hugo Chavez’s death in 2013, is seeking his third consecutive six-year term in office. Of the nine other candidates running for the presidency, his biggest challenger is a unified opposition movement that overcame their divisions to form a coalition known as the Democratic Unitary Platform.

The opposition movement has maintained its momentum despite sustained government repression, in which their first-choice candidate, María Corina Machado, was disqualified from running. Machado, an avowed capitalist who has promised privatization of several state industries, has since rallied for her replacement, the soft-spoken former diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia.

The vote has come at a crucial moment for Venezuela, which has experienced violent repression under Maduro’s watch and the worst economic collapse of a peacetime country in recent history. The oil-rich nation, once the fifth-largest economy in Latin America, has seen its economy shrink in the last decade to the equivalent of a medium-sized city, according to data from the International Monetary Fund. 

Punishing sanctions on the regime by the United States and European Union have failed to topple the populist incumbent, who argues that Venezuela’s woes are due to being a victim of an “economic war.”

Around eight million Venezuelans have fled the country amid shortages of vital goods and soaring inflation.

There has been mounting concern that the opposition will not see a fair contest as Maduro’s government controls all public institutions in Venezuela and has been accused of rigging previous votes, which it denied. Experts note, however, that concerns of vote tampering may be mitigated by the planned presence of opposition party representatives at each polling station.

The election campaign has seen at least 71 people arbitrarily detained – the majority of whom provided some sort of service to the opposition – and a dozen online media outlets blocked within the country, according to human rights organization Laboratorio de Paz.

The government has also created significant impediments for the millions of Venezuelans abroad to vote, including widely unattainable passport and residency requirements.

A limited group of election observers, including a team from The Carter Center – a non-profit organization set up by former US President Jimmy Carter – will be on the ground. But several international election observers have announced this week that they will no longer travel to Venezuela to monitor the vote.

Latin American leaders, including Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, have called on Maduro to commit to stepping down if he loses. Venezuelan opposition figures have also appealed to the country’s military, that has long supported Maduro and his predecessor, to respect the results. The Venezuelan leader has said his victory will ensure “peace” in the country.

How the army reacts to the outcome could be an important factor in any scenario, but analysts say it impossible to parse where it stands.

Polls will close at 6 p.m ET.

Israel vowed Hezbollah will “pay the price” after blaming the Lebanese militant group for a rocket attack in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights that killed 12 children, touching off fears once again that an all-out war would envelop the region.

Hezbollah says it “firmly denies” it was behind the strike, the deadliest to hit Israel since the October 7 attacks.

Israeli warplanes conducted airstrikes against Hezbollah targets “deep inside Lebanese territory” and along the border overnight Sunday, according to a statement from the military on Sunday morning. It was not immediately clear whether there were any casualties from those strikes.

And on a visit to the town of Majdal Shams near the Syrian and Lebanese borders, where the rocket attack left children and teenagers dead on Saturday, Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant pledged a heavy response.

“Hezbollah is responsible for this and they will pay the price,” Gallant said. In an earlier statement from his office, he added: “We will hit the enemy hard.”

The Saturday attacks on the region involved “approximately 30 projectiles” crossing from Lebanon into Israeli territory, in a barrage Israel’s military quickly blamed on the Iran-backed militant group.

Among the sites hit in the attack was a soccer field where children and teenagers had been playing, IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said.

Some 20,000 Druze Arabs live in the Golan Heights, an area Israel seized from Syria in 1967 during the Six-Day War and annexed in 1981. Considered occupied territory under international law and UN Security Council resolutions, the area is also home to about 50,000 Israeli Jewish settlers. Most Druze there identify as Syrian and have rejected offers of Israeli citizenship.

Israel and Hezbollah have been trading rocket fire on a near-daily basis since Hamas’ attacks on Israel on October 7, and those exchanges have become increasingly volatile, sparking fears on several occasions that Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza would spiral into a conflict on multiple fronts across the Middle East.

While Hezbollah admitted striking the Golan Heights on Saturday it rejected responsibility for the attack on Majdal Shams.

“We confirm that the Islamic Resistance has no connection to the incident whatsoever and firmly denies all false claims in this regard,” a statement read.

Israel’s initial overnight response appeared to stop short of the kind of attack that would launch an all-out war, but it gave rise to an incredibly tense day in the region.

Iran on Sunday warned Israel against “any new adventures” aimed at Lebanon, in a statement issued by foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani. The statement said Israel “does not have the minimum moral authority to comment and judge about the incident that happened in Majdal Shams area, and the claims of this regime against others will not be heard either.”

A very specialized part of the world’s largest naval drills off the northern Hawaiian island of Kauai is gaining attention on both sides of the Pacific.

Earlier this month, the US and allies practiced taking out a large surface ship with long-range weapons, including, for the first time, a US Air Force B-2 bomber.

In one test that analysts called “very significant” in what it could mean for the calculus of any future, hypothetical conflict between the US and China, a B-2 stealth bomber hit a decommissioned amphibious assault ship with an inexpensive guided bomb.

The test of the weapon, dubbed QUICKSINK by the US Air Force, occurred on July 19, when a B-2 participated in the sinking of the ex-USS Tarawa, a retired 820-foot-long, 39,000-ton amphibious assault ship, a vessel the size of a small aircraft carrier.

It showed the US military can use one of its most survivable weapons platforms, the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber, to sink a major surface ship with a low-cost guided bomb.

“This capability is an answer to an urgent need to quickly neutralize maritime threats over massive expanses of ocean around the world at minimal costs,” said a press release from the US Navy’s 3rd Fleet, which led Rim of the Pacific 2024 (RIMPAC), the exercise that included the sinking of the ex-Tarawa.

The B-2 bomber is the US military’s most sophisticated aircraft. The Air Force says its stealthy characteristics allow it to penetrate heavily defended areas and also fly with a small chance of being detected by radar at high altitudes. That gives the B-2’s sensors the ability to get a view of the battlefield not possible in lower-flying planes.

Mating it up with relatively cheap and demonstrably effective precision-guided bombs with warheads of up to 2,000 pounds could give the Air Force bombers the “anti-ship lethality” of a submarine-launched torpedo without the liabilities of a submarine, according to a US Air Force website.

“A Navy submarine has the ability to launch and destroy a ship with a single torpedo at any time, but by launching that weapon, it gives away its location and becomes a target,” the Air Force Research Lab says.

QUICKSINK could provide “a low-cost method of achieving torpedo-like seaworthy kills from the air at a much higher pace and over a much larger area than covered by a lumbering submarine,” it says.

The Air Force first tested QUICKSINK in 2022, when an F-15 fighter jet released a GBU-31 Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) that destroyed a full-scale surface target in the Gulf of Mexico, according to an Air Force statement.

Analysts say QUICKSINK launched from a B-2 would give China’s People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) much to consider in the event of any possible conflict in the western Pacific, including around hotspots like Taiwan, the Philippines and the southern islands of Japan.

“It is very significant,” said Carl Schuster, former head of the US Pacific Command Joint Intelligence Center.

“The B-2’s demonstrated anti-maritime capability will constrain if not deter PLAN operations east of Taiwan or off the Philippines.

“You cannot ignore a weapon that can sink a 25,000-plus-ton ship with one hit,” Schuster added.

In any conflict close to its home shores, China, on paper, holds distinct advantages.

It has thousands of missiles on the Chinese mainland, the world’s largest navy to dominate nearby seas and the ability to provide air cover to those ships from land-based aircraft.

But the B-2, and other systems tested at RIMPAC, could negate some of China’s advantages with long-range fire, analysts said.

“It extends the range at which potential enemies can be held at risk through advanced weapons whilst retaining a considerable degree of stealth. It basically says, you are not safe no matter where you are in this vast theater,” said Alessio Patalano, professor of war and strategy at King’s College in London.

Anti-ship missiles

Long-range missiles were also fired from aircraft and ships during RIMPAC.

A US Navy F/A-18 also hit the ex-Tarawa with a Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRSAM), “a precise, stealthy, and survivable cruise missile,” the Navy’s 3rd Fleet press release said.

This missile can hit targets up to 230 miles (370 kilometers) away with a 1,000-pound warhead while navigating semi-autonomously to its target.

And the Royal Australian Navy destroyer HMAS Sydney struck the ex-Tarawa with a Naval Strike Missile (NSM), an achievement Vice Adm. Mark Hammond, Australia’s chief of navy, said “represents a significant increase in the lethality of our surface fleet.”

“Multi-domain strike capabilities including Naval Strike Missile are foundational to deterring any potential adversary’s attempts to project power against Australia,” he said.

The Naval Strike Missile, developed by Norwegian defense company Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace, can challenge an adversary’s defenses by flying at sea-skimming altitudes and making evasive maneuvers in flight at a range of 115 miles (185 kilometers).

A US Navy destroyer, USS Fitzgerald, also tested a Naval Strike Missile during RIMPAC, and the weapon has previously been fired from a US littoral combat ship and land-based versions have been successfully tested by the US Marine Corps.

The ex-Tarawa was one of two surface vessels sunk during RIMPAC. On July 11, the ex-USS Dubuque, a 17,000-ton amphibious transport dock was sent to the bottom of the Pacific, also off Kauai.

‘Real-world experience’

Besides the US and Australian units, forces from South Korea, Malaysia and the Netherlands participated in ship-sinking exercises.

“Sinking exercises give us a chance to sharpen our skills, learn from one another, and get real-world experience,” US Navy Vice Adm. John Wade, RIMPAC 2024 Combined Task Force commander, said in a statement.

“Using advanced weapons and seeing the professionalism of our teams during these drills shows our commitment to keeping the Indo-Pacific region safe and open.”

John Bradford, a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs fellow, said the RIMPAC tests show what kind of conflict the US is preparing for in the region.

“We can fully expect a major power naval conflict in the Pacific to be predominantly a fight of long-range weapons,” Bradford said.

“The US is investing in readiness for this sort of combat,” he said.

View from China

China was taking note of the RIMPAC plans even before the ship-sinking exercises took place.

A commentary in the state-run Global Times on June 27, the day RIMPAC began, said, “the only country deemed as ‘enemy’ by the US that operates a 40,000-ton amphibious assault ship in the Asia-Pacific region is China.”

The PLA Navy has three Type 075 amphibious assault ships, which displace around 36,000 tons, in service with a fourth being readied. A bigger successor, the Type 076, is also under construction.

Global Times has previously cited Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert and TV commentator, as saying the Type 075s could be called into action in the Taiwan Strait or South China Sea if the situation dictated it.

“The choice of the USS Tarawa as the sinking target reflects the concern of the US and its allies about the development and strength of China’s maritime power, especially regarding the mainland’s military deterrence on the Taiwan island,” the Global Times commentary said.

But it said sinking the ex-Tarawa, which was commissioned in 1976, had little relevance in 2024.

“Such an outdated ship cannot be compared with modern military equipment,” Global Times said.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will hold a trilateral meeting with his Japanese and South Korean counterparts in Tokyo on Sunday local time, the first of its kind in 15 years, a senior US defense official said.

The trilateral meeting came nearly one year after President Joe Biden held the first stand-alone summit with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol at Camp David in August 2023. Following the summit, Kishida announced that annual recurring summits will be held among several of the nations’ highest officials, including the ministers of foreign affairs, defense, and national security advisers, along with the financial, industry, and commerce ministers.

“We’ve made enormous progress, trilateral since the Camp David summit, with early warning missile data sharing real time with a trilateral exercise plan,” the US senior defense official said.

According to the defense official, Secretary Austin is expected to announce the US intends to reconstitute US Forces Japan (USF-J) as a joint force headquarters to serve as a counterpart to Japan’s Joint Operations Command (J-JOC). Details of this implementation will be figured out in working groups led by US Indo-Pacific Command. There is no intention to integrate Japanese forces into the US commands, according to the official.

“The intent here is for USF-J to become a standalone three-star joint force headquarters. Eventually separate and apart from 5th Air Force,” the official said.

“We view this as a historic announcement among the strongest improvements to our military ties in 70 years. Bottom line is that this is a transformative change. And that’s because when this transition is complete, USF-J will have a direct leadership role in planning and leading US forces in both peace time and potential crises. And they’ll be doing that side by side with Japanese forces like never before.”

At least 11 people have been injured after projectiles were reportedly fired from Lebanon into Majdal Shams, Golan Heights on Saturday, according to the Israel Defense Forces and Israel’s national emergency service.

“A short while ago, sirens sounded in the area of Majdal Shams. One projectile was identified crossing from Lebanon toward the area. A hit was identified in the area. Injuries were reported,” the IDF said, adding that “approximately 30 projectiles were identified crossing from Lebanon into Israeli territory.”

A spokesperson for Magen David Adom (MDA) said that five people are in critical condition and six in serious condition in Majdal Shams, according to initial reports.

Searches of the area continue, the spokesperson said.

A large team from MDA has been sent to the scene. Paramedics are treating victims they say are aged between 10 and 20 years old.

Some are being treated at the scene and others have been transferred to local clinics. Evacuation helicopters, ambulances and intensive care vehicles have also been dispatched to the scene.

Idan Avshalom, a senior medic from MDA said, “We arrived at a soccer field and saw destruction and objects on fire. Injured people were lying on the grass and the sights were dire. We immediately began triaging the injured, some of the injured were sent to local clinics and our teams were also directed to the clinics. During the incident there were additional alerts and the medical treatment of the injured is still ongoing.”

Israeli police said that munitions have fallen in “multiple sites in the northern Golan.”

Police are “securing the area and searching for additional remnants to eliminate any further risk to the public,” the Police Spokesperson’s Unit said.

At least 30 people have been killed and over 100 injured in an Israeli airstrike on a school in Deir-al Balah, central Gaza, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza.

The Israeli military it had launched the strike in order to destroy a Hamas command and control center inside the compound.

Most of the victims from the school arriving to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the aftermath of the attack were women and children, according to Dr. Khalil Al-Daqran, a spokesperson for the hospital. More than 4,000 displaced people were housed in the school, the Palestinian Civil Defense said.

The strike came soon after Israeli’s military issued fresh evacuation orders further south, in the city of Khan Younis, where Israel launched a fresh offensive earlier in the week which has killed dozens of Palestinians.

Residents in southern neighborhoods were told to leave after being warned that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) would “forcefully operate” in the area.

Fighting has been ongoing on Gaza for months, and the renewed offensive shows Israel’s challenges in achieving its goal of eliminating Hamas. Israel said that about 100 militants had been killed during recent fighting.

The United Nations estimated that about 150,000 people fled Khan Younis on Monday alone, intensifying pressure on meager supplies of food and water, and places to seek shelter.

Signaling another campaign was imminent, the IDF wrote on Telegram it was “about to forcefully operate against the terrorist organizations and therefore calls on the remaining population left in the southern neighborhoods of Khan Yunis to temporarily evacuate to the adjusted Humanitarian Area in Al-Mawasi.”

The statement said the move was in retaliation to “significant terrorist activity and rocket fire” emanating from southern Khan Younis. It added that the location previously defined as a humanitarian area “will be adjusted.”

Al-Mawasi has come under repeated Israeli attacks, including a strike on July 14 which reportedly killed 90 people and injured 300 more.

Israel launched its military offensive in Gaza on October 7 after Hamas attacked southern Israel. At least 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 others abducted, according to Israeli authorities.

Israeli military action in Gaza has since killed 39,090 Palestinians and injured another 90,147, according to the Ministry of Health there. As of early July, nearly 2 million people had been displaced in Gaza – almost the entire population, according to figures from the UN.

Aid agencies working in Gaza have warned previously that new rounds of evacuation orders are making the delivery of emergency rations even more difficult.

“People in Gaza are exhausted, living in inhumane conditions, with no safety at all,” the UN Relief and Works Agency posted on X on Monday.

On Thursday, the IDF said it had recovered the bodies of five Israeli hostages the previous day from a tunnel in an area of Khan Younis which it had previously designated as a “humanitarian area.”

Despite the fighting, US and Israeli officials expressed optimism this week over the possibility of a ceasefire and hostage deal being reached.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday that the different parties are “inside the 10-yard line and driving toward the goal line.”

Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said he would likely dispatch a negotiation team to talks in Rome next week.

Netanyahu was in Washington this week and met with the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, who urged him to seal an agreement.

“As I just told Prime Minister Netanyahu, it is time to get this deal done,” said Harris. “So to everyone who has been calling for a ceasefire, and to everyone who yearns for peace, I see you and I hear you.”

This is a developing story and will be updated.