Gazans Weep and Pray Over Loved Ones Killed in Attack on Former School

A mother begs her dead child to take her hand. A young man, wrapped in bandages, lies weeping next to the corpse of another man. A little boy, his face coated in dust and blood, stares vacantly from a hospital floor as people shout frantically around him.

The scenes at the doorstep of the last functioning hospital in central Gaza, posted on social media by a Palestinian videographer after an Israeli strike hit a United Nations school complex, have yet again highlighted the awful dilemma that Palestinian civilians keep facing through eight months of war: The places where they seek refuge often end up being attacked.

The videos were posted to Instagram on Thursday after the strike. The New York Times verified that they were shot at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in the central Gaza city of Deir al Balah.

In the early morning hours of Thursday, Israel launched a strike on a school complex housing thousands of displaced Palestinians who had sought shelter there. Dozens were killed. Israel says its attack targeted and killed Hamas operatives using the school building as a base. Palestinian medical workers say it killed civilians.

Of 40 dead bodies from the attack registered by Gaza’s Health Ministry, 14 were children and nine were women, the ministry said.